Maid dares employer to send her back to the agency, then begs to keep her job

SINGAPORE: One helper’s gamble appears to have backfired after she dared her employer to “send her back to the agency” if she was unhappy with her work.

Instead of brushing off the remark, the employer said she took the helper up on the challenge and wasted no time arranging for her to be sent home.

In a post on a local forum on Friday (June 5), the employer wrote, “I told the agent to buy the tickets to send her home (at my own expense). Afterwards, the agent informed me that she was begging to keep her job. I replied, ‘Not going to happen.’”

Still clearly frustrated by the experience, the employer said she believes too many helpers assume they can simply move to another household if things do not go their way.

“Cocky people who cannot tell the difference between privilege and entitlement need to be humbled. There are far too many helpers who come here thinking they can transfer to a less demanding household just by doing a bad job and asking to go back to the agency. Unfortunately for my helper, she will find that I am not a pushover.”

The employer then listed a series of incidents that she said convinced her the helper was not suitable for the job. Among them were allegedly mixing up different sets of clothes, dressing her child in clothes worn inside out, and repeatedly packing her child’s school bag with missing items despite a packing list being clearly displayed.

She also claimed the helper would refill an insulated bottle with hot water from the previous day, even after it had already gone cold.

Then came the request that she found particularly cheeky. According to the employer, the helper wanted to spend her day off in Kuala Lumpur and even asked the family to help her buy BTS concert tickets.

The employer said she had already been warned that the helper had “an attitude problem” before joining the household. 

Even so, she and her family decided to give her a chance, believing she might simply have been misunderstood or that her previous employers, who were elderly, had been overly impatient or critical.

Looking back, she said that assumption turned out to be wrong.

“Boy, were we wrong. So we decided not to pass this rotten apple around,” she said. “If financially possible, I strongly encourage everyone who has problematic helpers to send them back to where they came from instead of passing the rotten apple around.”

“Good job.”

Many commenters appeared to support the employer’s decision.

One Singaporean Redditor praised her for standing firm, writing, “Well done. Some of these helpers really think they are very smart and can challenge employers.”

Another commented, “Kudos. Your statement of not passing the bad apple.”

A third joked, “Requested to help her buy a BTS ticket. Lol… But we Sinkies are the entitled ones, wor. Anyway, good job.”

Meanwhile, another commenter argued that the helper’s last-minute pleas were probably motivated by self-interest rather than genuine remorse.

“The worst part is these people aren’t begging out of contrition or a real lesson learned. They just want to get back and continue.”

In other news, a 32-year-old healthcare worker earning up to S$8.5k a month says the brutal hours and constant stress of her job eventually destroyed her health, leaving her with “stage 3 cancer, chest pains, gastritis, burnout, depression, and anxiety.”

In a Reddit post, the woman shared that she spent seven years in the healthcare sector, often surviving on just three hours of sleep while juggling full-day shifts and 24/7 on-call duties for an entire week.

Read also: Healthcare worker earning S$8.5k says years of stress and long hours left her with cancer, chest pains, gastritis, and mental health struggles