E-commerce development: building an online store in Singapore
What an online shop needs beyond a website: platform choice, local payments such as PayNow, GST, personal data, speed, and selling inside a mobile app.
An online store is a website with a shop’s responsibilities attached: taking payment, keeping stock and prices right, collecting customers’ details and handling returns. The build is only part of the work. This guide covers the decisions that shape it.
Hosted platform or custom build
A hosted e-commerce platform supplies the catalogue, cart, checkout, payments and hosting for a monthly fee, and is the simpler starting point for a standard catalogue. A custom build makes sense when the business model does not fit a platform: unusual pricing, complex product configuration, or deep links to existing systems. The decision drives cost more than anything else, so make it before collecting quotes.
Payments that Singapore customers expect
Card payments usually run through a payment provider rather than through the store itself. Many Singapore shoppers also expect PayNow. According to the Association of Banks in Singapore, PayNow moves Singapore dollar funds between participating banks and e-wallets through FAST using a mobile number, NRIC/FIN or a virtual payment address. Businesses receive payments by linking their UEN, and customers can pay by scanning PayNow QR codes and SGQR codes that carry the PayNow logo. Ask whether your platform or payment provider supports PayNow at checkout and how payments are matched to orders.
GST
Whether you charge GST depends on your turnover, not on selling online. IRAS states that registration is compulsory when taxable turnover is more than $1 million at the end of a calendar year, or is expected to exceed $1 million in the next 12 months. If you are registered or expect to be, the store must show prices and produce invoices correctly; check this when you choose the platform, not after launch.
Customer data
A shop collects names, addresses, phone numbers and order histories, so the PDPA applies in full. Among the PDPC’s obligations are using personal data only for the purposes people consented to (details given for an order are not consent to marketing), protecting the data, keeping it only as long as needed, and notifying the PDPC and customers of a breach that is likely to cause significant harm. Decide which staff and which apps can see customer data, and remove access when people leave.
Speed
Speed matters most on product and checkout pages. Hold the store to Google’s Core Web Vitals thresholds: Largest Contentful Paint within 2.5 seconds, Interaction to Next Paint of 200 milliseconds or less, and Cumulative Layout Shift of 0.1 or less, measured at the 75th percentile on mobile. Large images and third-party scripts are worth checking first.
Selling inside a mobile app
A shopping app is a second front end on the same store. If any part of it unlocks digital features or content, Apple’s App Review Guidelines require in-app purchase for that (guideline 3.1.1), so read section 3.1 before planning payments in an iOS app. The iOS and Android guides cover the store requirements.
Before launch
- Place real test orders with every payment method, including refunds.
- Check prices, delivery fees and tax lines on invoices.
- Confirm order and customer emails reach the right inbox.
- Make sure the privacy notice and terms are linked at checkout.
- Make sure you hold the admin, payment provider and domain accounts yourself.
For the general website side of the project, see website development.