PARF Rebate Singapore: How to Check It and What Budget 2026 Changed

For most Singaporean car owners, the PARF rebate is money they're entitled to but rarely think about — until the car approaches 10 years old and a major financial decision looms. Budget 2026 halved the rebate cap and slashed the percentage rates. If your car was registered before 13 February 2026, your PARF value is meaningfully higher than a car bought after that date. Here is what you need to know.

What the PARF Rebate Is

PARF stands for Preferential Additional Registration Fee. When you register a car in Singapore, you pay an Additional Registration Fee (ARF) based on the car's Open Market Value (OMV). The ARF is calculated on a tiered scale and can run into tens of thousands of dollars for higher-OMV vehicles.

The PARF rebate is a partial refund of the ARF you paid, returned when you deregister the vehicle before it reaches ten years old. The older the car at deregistration, the smaller the percentage returned. At age ten, the car is typically either scrapped (and you receive zero PARF, since the full ten-year period has elapsed) or the owner pays the PQP to extend entitlement — at which point the PARF rebate is forfeited permanently.

The COE rebate is a separate component: a partial refund of the remaining months on the COE. Both PARF and COE rebate make up the car's "paper value" — what the scrap dealer effectively pays you, with the government refund processed separately.

How to Enquire Your PARF Rebate

You can check your PARF rebate value on the LTA's OneMotoring portal at onemotoring.lta.gov.sg.

Steps: 1. Log in with your Singpass account. 2. Navigate to "Vehicle" and select "Enquire Vehicle Details." 3. Enter your vehicle registration number. 4. The system shows current PARF and COE rebate values, as well as road tax expiry and other registration data.

The PARF value shown is what you would receive if you deregistered the car on that day. It decreases as the car ages. There is no phone enquiry line specifically for PARF — the OneMotoring portal is the authoritative source.

If you are buying a used car, you can also check the PARF value of a listed vehicle by entering its registration number. This is important context when assessing whether the seller's asking price appropriately reflects the paper value embedded in the car.

The Budget 2026 Change: What Happened

Effective from the second February 2026 COE bidding exercise (13 February 2026), the government restructured the PARF rebate schedule significantly.

Old rules: - Deregistration at under 5 years: 75% of ARF returned - Deregistration at 9–10 years: 50% of ARF returned - Maximum rebate cap: S$60,000

New rules (cars registered from 13 February 2026): - Deregistration at under 5 years: 30% of ARF returned - Deregistration at 9–10 years: 5% of ARF returned - Maximum rebate cap: S$30,000

The practical impact is severe for higher-OMV vehicles. Take a car with an OMV of S$60,000, where the ARF might be approximately S$80,000. Under the old system, scrapping at year nine would return roughly S$40,000 in PARF. Under the new system, the same car scrapped at year nine returns only S$4,000.

For mass-market cars with lower OMV, the absolute dollar loss is smaller, but the structural change is the same: the "backend value" that previously cushioned depreciation has almost entirely disappeared for new registrations.

Why This Matters for Pre-February 2026 Cars

A car registered before 13 February 2026 retains the old PARF schedule. This means it has materially higher scrap value than an equivalent car registered in March 2026 onward.

The used car market has already begun pricing this in. "Pre-2026" cars now trade at a premium because their paper value is higher. When evaluating a used car, ask: when was it registered, and which PARF regime applies?

For owners: if you are holding a pre-2026 car in good condition, the old logic of selling early to "cash out the PARF" while it is still high is now worth revisiting. With the old rebate schedule, your car genuinely holds more value than newer equivalents. That is an asset — and the decision to sell or hold should factor in the actual PARF amount retrievable, not just list price comparisons.

PARF and COE Renewal: The Interaction

When a car owner chooses to renew the COE — paying the Prevailing Quota Premium to extend entitlement by five or ten years — the PARF rebate is forfeited immediately. It cannot be claimed later. The car surrenders its "government cash-back" at the moment of renewal.

This is a hidden cost that many renewal-focused guides bury. If your car has a PARF rebate of S$12,000 at the point of renewal, that S$12,000 should be added to the true cost of renewal when comparing "renew" versus "scrap and buy new." The Quota Premium you pay is the visible cost; the forfeited PARF is the invisible one.

The Singapore COE Navigator includes a decision matrix that factors in both components, so you can see the genuine all-in cost of renewing versus the realistic depreciation curve of buying new — under both the old and new PARF regimes.

Get the Singapore COE Navigator

The Bottom Line

You can check your PARF rebate today via OneMotoring with your Singpass login — it takes about two minutes. Cars registered before 13 February 2026 retain the old rebate schedule (up to 75% of ARF, capped at S$60,000). Cars registered after that date are subject to sharply reduced rates (up to 30%, capped at S$30,000). The single most important variable in any scrap, sell, or renew decision is knowing your car's actual PARF value and which regime governs it.