The move follows a request by local recruitment firms to the authorities after reaching a deadlock in wage negotiations with Indonesian recruiters that send workers, Al-Riyadh newspaper reported on Saturday.

In the meantime, labor recruiters have been seeking alternative sources of labor from countries such as Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia.

Local labor recruiters claim there has been unjustifiable increases in the cost of recruiting Indonesian domestic workers.

"The recruitment cost shot up 300 percent — from SR2,800 to SR7,500  — over the past three years. There had been frequent hikes in recruitment charges, and most of these excessively high hikes were made without giving any genuine reasons and justifications," said one recruiter, adding that Saudi recruitment firms have rejected the latest increase of SR375 made by the Indonesian government in April. Recruiters claim the total cost for hiring an Indonesian maid is at least SR9,000.

At the same time, Saudi firms accuse their Indonesian counterparts of failing to fulfill most of their commitments, including providing one month of training and orientation for maids coming to the Kingdom. They say that this exacerbates the problem of runaway housemaids.

Jamal Al-Mofavaz, a Saudi investor in the recruitment market, said that the number of Indonesian domestic workers in the Kingdom fluctuates between 1.2 million and 1.5 million.

“Saudi families spend more than SR20 billion in this sector in a year. In addition to this, they incur losses to the tune of 30 percent of this amount due to failure on the part of housemaids to fulfill provisions of labor contracts,” he said, attributing this mainly to the absence of effective regulations to protect the rights of Saudi families.

According to Al-Mofavaz, Saudi citizens are forced to pay at least SR2,500 to recruit a single domestic worker to Indonesian recruitment offices and their respective agents.

“This is unjustifiable and incomprehensible. The current relations between Saudi recruitment offices and their Indonesian counterparts are one-sided,” he said while underlining the need to establish mutually balanced relations based on principles of partnership and reciprocal respect.

He also noted that Saudi recruitment offices agreed nearly two years ago to the Indonesian demand to increase the monthly wage of Indonesian maids from SR600 to SR800.

Abdullah Al-Hamoud, former chairman of the Saudi Recruitment Committee at the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said that the cost of recruitment has surged 30 percent over the last six months.

“These agencies, which provide the recruitment offices with labor, harbor the blame for huge increases in recruitment charges. These brokers are now demanding up to $700 for each housemaid from recruitment firms," he said.