What is a locum doctor?

The bulk of locum shifts advertised in Singapore are ordinary general practice sessions at private clinics. A clinic typically looks for a locum when it needs to:

• cover a permanent doctor’s annual, medical, or maternity leave;
• fill sessions at a clinic whose regular doctor works part time;
• add capacity during a seasonal surge or an unusually busy stretch; or
• staff a newly opened branch before a permanent doctor is recruited.

The clinical work is what a GP does on any other day: consultations for acute illness, chronic disease reviews, minor procedures, medical certificates and memos, referrals, and dispensing where the clinic runs its own pharmacy. You work in the clinic’s premises, with its staff, its systems, and its patients.

Outside general practice, locum sessions also appear at aesthetic clinics, health screening centres, occupational and corporate health providers, and short-term vaccination or screening exercises. These usually ask for specific prior experience, and there are far fewer of them than GP sessions.

Locum doctors are almost always paid by the hour, at a rate agreed before the shift starts. A smaller number of sessions are quoted as a flat fee for the whole session. Either way the arrangement is per shift: there is no continuing employment contract, no notice period, and no obligation on either side once the session ends.

Doctors are engaged directly by the clinic or by the group that operates it, which means you negotiate the rate and the terms with the clinic itself. You remain responsible for your own registration, practising certificate, professional indemnity insurance, continuing medical education, and taxes.

Shift length varies. Some clinics advertise a single three or four hour session; others want a full day of eight to twelve hours, or a run of consecutive days to cover a longer absence. Demand is heaviest where permanent doctors are least available: weekday evenings, weekends, and public holidays.

Sessions are usually arranged in advance rather than on the day. A clinic advertises the dates and hours it needs covered, doctors get in touch, and the clinic confirms one. How far ahead this happens ranges from a fortnight or more for planned leave down to the same week when a doctor calls in sick.

The two models trade security for control:

Many doctors do not treat this as a binary choice. It is common to hold a permanent or part-time position and take locum sessions around it, or to locum for a period while deciding on a longer-term role. Regular locum work at one clinic also has a way of turning into a standing arrangement, and sometimes into a permanent offer, because both sides already know how the other works.

Advertised hourly rates for GP locum shifts in Singapore typically run between $110 and $140 per hour, with a median of roughly $120 per hour. Rates tend to sit higher for weekend sessions, public holidays, and late evening cover, and lower for quieter weekday daytime sessions.

Because a locum is paid only for hours worked, comparing an hourly rate with a permanent salary means accounting for unpaid leave, gaps between sessions, and the benefits a permanent post carries. For current figures broken down by region, day of week, and time of day, see locum GP rates in Singapore.

Working an unsupervised locum session means practising independently, so you need registration with the Singapore Medical Council that allows you to do so, together with a valid practising certificate and your own professional indemnity cover. Doctors on conditional registration work under supervision arrangements that ordinarily rule out independent locum sessions.

For the practical steps (registration, indemnity, what clinics ask for, and how to approach your first shift), see how to start locum work in Singapore.

The clearest way to understand locum work is to look at what clinics are asking for right now: which dates, which hours, which parts of the island, and at what rate.