Survey finds 59% of Singapore respondents build tools on an ad hoc basis
Singapore employers building their own workplace tools risk legal and operational problems if they do so without proper governance, according to global employment platform Remote.
The warning comes as new research from Remote found that 96% of Singapore respondents said their organisations had built internal tools, automations or workflows instead of buying off-the-shelf software in the past 12 months.
Eli Chuah, APAC Senior Consultant at Remote, said that while the appetite to build is there, HR teams must treat these tools with the same care as any other system handling employee data.
"Singapore's People and HR teams have proven they can build. The tools exist and the appetite to keep building is clearly there," Chuah said in a statement.
"The next test is doing it with the same rigour as any other system that touches employee data: clear ownership, unified data, and compliance built in from day one. Skip that, and tools meant to save time can create legal and operational exposure instead."
Strategy lagging behind
The findings suggest many organisations are building without a clear plan. Only 37% of Singapore respondents described custom AI development at their organisation as a deliberate strategy, while 59% said they were building on an ad hoc basis, solving problems as they arose.
Despite this, 96% said they expected to increase their reliance on building custom tools over the next two years.
Remote said an ad hoc approach could become a business risk when custom tools multiply without a connected foundation.
It warned that disconnected data, unclear ownership and inconsistent controls could lead to operational errors and compliance gaps, particularly where tools influence sensitive decisions or financial workflows.
Some of these issues are already surfacing. Among Singapore respondents, 35% cited regulatory compliance concerns as a barrier to getting more value from AI. Another 33% said their data, processes or knowledge systems were not ready for AI, and 32% said they had too many disconnected tools and experiments to manage.
Separate research from the Singapore National Employers Federation (SNEF), released on 30 October, points to similar concerns.
In SNEF's survey of 1,000 employers, 42% of those exploring or using AI in HR said they wanted greater clarity on obligations and liability. Among employers already using AI, 35% cited accountability when AI makes errors as a concern.
However, the SNEF survey also found that human oversight remains widespread, with 85% of AI-supported HR use cases still requiring human confirmation or sign-off.
Payroll a high-stakes test
Chuah singled out payroll as an area where organisations should be cautious about relying on homegrown solutions.
"It's a pattern we see everywhere: teams are comfortable building the workflow layer themselves, but still need trusted, governed infrastructure underneath for high-stakes parts like payroll," Chuah said.
According to the Remote survey, just 19% of Singapore respondents currently use AI for payroll support, compared with 27% in both the UK and Australia.
Remote, which provides global payroll and employer of record services, said payroll depends on accurate workforce data, strong controls and local regulatory expertise. It added that extending custom tools into such sensitive financial operations requires dependable infrastructure, not simply another layer of automation.
Singapore's 96% build rate was one of the highest among the markets surveyed, just behind Australia at 97% and above the 91% global average reported by Remote.
The company said the question for Singapore businesses is no longer whether AI will change how they operate, but whether they can turn rapid experimentation into a deliberate strategy.
