A foreign domestic helper who told her employer that she was going on holiday to India to visit her ailing mother suddenly messaged to inform them that she did not want to return.
In an anonymous post to Facebook group FDW in Singapore (working conditions forum), the maid’s employer asked what he should do as his wife was pregnant and about to deliver her child in January.
The employer wrote: “Our helper’s mother health is not good back at India, so we allowed her to go and check if all ok. Now she messaged and said she doesn’t want to come back and that we should look for replacement!”
He added that he and his wife hired the maid in May, almost a year ahead of when his wife was set to give birth. “I understand she might have problems back at her home but abandoning us in between in this situation is not good”, he wrote.
The employer then wrote that the family invested time and money in their maid by buying her a new bed, wardrobe, and gifts for her and had given her cash as well. He also added that his maid did not have much work daily, and she was free to take about three hours off in the afternoons daily.
“As per 2 year contract terms, she has to serve 1 month notice period or has to pay one month of salary in lieu to us. We did not get any of this. I know we can get replacement but all this feels wasted. Now i dont have confidence in next helper. Dont know when they will leave giving us some false reasons”, the man wrote.
In his post, he asked others what they could do and what the next steps were. He also asked others in the group about the role that the agency played in this case.
Here’s what netizens said:
Earlier this year, a 24-year-old Filipino maid ran away after being with her employers for four months. In an anonymous post to Facebook group FDW in Singapore (working conditions forum), her employers wrote that she ran away to HOME, the Humanitarian Organization for Migration Economics.
The employers added that she had been “very turned off most of the time when with us and cannot remember things or take instructions. She is 24 year old Filipino, yet cannot understand English well”.
In their post, they wrote that after running away two months ago, the maid had been posting on social media about her days off on Sundays instead of searching for another employer.
“We gave her the chance to stay on when MOM asked if would like to send her home immediately. But now it seems like she cannot find employment, we do not wish to send her back now after she had a fun time in Singapore”, her previous employer wrote. In their post, they said that they wanted the helper to work under another employer to experience what it was like to be working as a Foreign Domestic Worker (FDW).
“Where can I find an agency willing to take her, when the agency she came here with does not want her anymore? Do I have a choice to still send her back to the agency she came with regardless?”, her employer asked.