Recruiters Cheat Maids Into Taking Less Money

By Author: Maid Agency
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Women coming to the UAE to work as maids are being cheated by maids agencies in Dubai by arranging to pay less salary than the minimum salary set by their home governments.

The Philippine government has fixed a minimum salary of US$400 (Dh 1500) per month for Filipinos who work as domestic helpers overseas. But most of the times these helpers are paid little more than half of the minimum salary set: actual salary paid in the UAE is Dh850 or even lesser, says a group that helps Filipino house helpers in difficulty.

Many of these maids are sufferers of contract replacement. They sign a contract in the Philippines that guarantees a specific salary but when they come in the UAE they are demanded to sign another contract for a lesser salary. They are asked to sign the second contract by maids agency in Dubai who have conspired with agents in the native countries of the maids. She cannot do anything about it once she is in the UAE even if the salary is lesser because she has already signed the agreement. Also now and then these maids ...
... are compelled to sign an agreement written in Arabic which they don’t comprehend. Some maids say that they are in fact asked to sign an agreement by maids dubai agency that was covered up so that they could not notice what they were signing.

To prevent exploitation of domestic workers, the Philippine government has specified some guidelines like the minimum wage to be paid is US$400, increasing the minimum age to 25 years at which domestic helpers can leave the country and going through orientation programs before leaving.

A foreign recruitment agency in Manila says that many maids have no option but to sign the second agreement as they are keen to work abroad.

A maid was tempted to go to Dubai by an agency in Philippines promising to pay her Dh1500 monthly to look after an aged woman but she signed a contract in the UAE and ended up working for Dh850. And on top she came to an agreement to pay a placement fee of Dh4300 to the agency.

Indonesian maids also face a problem agreement substitution. Last year the Indonesian nationals were cautioned prior to they left for UAE that agreements that are signed in Jakarta were void in the UAE.