After suffering a year of stuttering salaries, Singapore’s IT professionals might soon get their own back on the banks as rising recruitment levels push up pay increments for experienced developers.

Credit Suisse and Merrill Lynch have recently joined RBS, Barclays and Standard Chartered as the city state’s main finance tech recruiters.

Although they aren’t yet hiring as much as in 2006/2007, vacancy numbers have increased in the last month and are expected to grow for the foreseeable future.

And in another new development in the war for techie talent, Credit Suisse, Merrill, and SCB are willing to consider large salary rises for IT people they poach from competitors.

“For some jobs, Standard Chartered is now saying ‘money is no object’, says one headhunter who asked not to be named.

This could potential affect the ability of Barclays and RBS to compete in the hiring market because they have stricter salary bands and generally pay lower wages than the three banks mentioned above, says the anonymous recruiter.

“Overall in Singapore, pay increments went down after the collapse of Lehman last year, then they stabilised. Very recently, some banks have just started to increase the size of their offers, from the usual 5 to 10 per cent over current salary, to in some cases 20 per cent.” says Will Feint, principal consultant at recruiters Confero.

But big base boosting isn’t yet happening across the board and is mainly affecting high-level developer jobs.

“Development that had been mothballed has now been given the go ahead. But over the next view months we might see pay rises for roles that support these projects, such as infrastructure, business analyst and project management positions,” adds Feint.

For now, most junior IT people must content themselves with stable salaries if they stay in their current roles, or minimal rises if they move.

In the current employment market, these candidates should avoid having unrealistic expectations about compensation. “Instead focus on finding a role best suited to your skills and experience, looking at where future growth potential exists,” comments Guru Mani, a senior consultant at Reed.

Sohrab Singh, manager, IT finance services division at Robert Walters, says individual compensation rates depend on several factors: business impact (trade-floor support pays well); technical competency; business interface (candidates who understand banking are in demand); line management; and strategy and budgetary responsibilities.

“For example, a software developer who has had experience with the entire software development lifecycle would command a salary premium over another candidate who is only involved in enhancements and fixes,” adds Singh.