M'sian man in S'pore loses S$6,500 to PR application scam that claimed to have '95 per cent success rate'

A chef who had worked for 20 years in Singapore lost S$6,500 to a scam that promised to help him secure permanent residency.

The scammers claimed to have an application that could calculate the man's "qualification rate", the victim told Shin Min Daily News.

He also lamented that he had fallen victim to the scam as it was "so realistic", and not because he had been naive.

Realistic scam

The 42-year-old man, surnamed Lai (transliterated), was originally from Perak, Malaysia.

He reportedly previously attempted to apply for permanent residency twice, but failed each time.

"I thought that maybe I had not done a good job and wanted to find someone professional to help me apply," he said.

In November 2025, he came across an advertisement on Facebook by a company that claimed to have a 95 per cent success rate with permanent residency applications.

It also stated that it had helped with over 1,000 successful applications to date.

Fees and last-minute cancellations

After contacting the advertiser, Lai was asked to pay the other party a "preliminary application fee" of S$300 and a "document verification fee" of S$1,200 between December 2025 and January 2026.

The scammer then sent him a letter with the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority's (ICA) logo, apparently arranging two interviews at ICA's headquarters, both scheduled for 2pm.

However, both appointments were cancelled at the last minute.

Lai told the media that the scammers would call on the morning of the supposed interview dates and claim that the documents provided were insufficient.

Aside from asking for further documentation, they would also ask him to keep paying to "increase the success rate" of his application, which they claimed could be calculated on their internal "app".

The "app" apparently showed a coloured range chart, with red indicating the lowest chances of success and green indicating the highest.

Lai said he was regularly updated by the scammers on his "progress". He was told that he needed to minimally attain the orange level to have a chance of being approved.

He was also asked to invest in a company, which he did for S$3,000, and pay S$2,000 as a "confidentiality deposit".

However, the "success rate scores" appeared to remain stagnant.

After Lai was further asked to enrol in courses for S$5,000, he grew suspicious and stopped complying, before finally reporting the case to the police.

Sophisticated scams

According to Lai, the scammers "kindly" offered to cover half of the supposed language class tuition fees after he grew suspicious.

When he stopped paying any fees and asked for a refund, they claimed that he needed to pay an additional S$800 "handling fee" for the refund to be processed.

"When he sees that you're having second thoughts, he'll try to calm you down," Lai said.

He added that the scammers would continue sending persuasive messages after he stopped replying to them.

At one point, the scammers falsely claimed to know Members of Parliament, while promising that they went through formal channels and were legal.

They even set up a 24-hour customer service chat group to answer questions round the clock, said Lai.

Their methods were sophisticated and convincing, he said, adding: "The scam was so realistic, it wasn't that I was naive."

The scam comes after another Malaysian couple fell prey to a similar scam in Singapore in April 2025, eventually losing over S$80,000.

Top images via Shin Min