Families warned against SMS promoting maid recruitment firm

Author: 
DIANA AL-JASSEM | ARAB NEWS
Publication Date: 
Sun, 2011-11-13 02:03

A big number of citizens in Saudi Arabia recently received messages on their mobiles about a company in Jeddah that offers maids and drivers with a salary of SR600 to 800. They claimed that customers could choose between two contracts. The first contract costs SR5,000 and its duration is two years, while the second contract is SR8,000 for more than two years.
Arab News spoke to officials in the ministries of labor and interior to verify the validity of these offices.
Saeed Al-Ghamdi, head assistant of the recruitment department in the Ministry of Labor, confirmed that such offices were fake and not licensed by the ministry.
“We want to warn the citizens from these offices, who just claim they offer maids and drivers to gain money. These offices are illegal. We sent a team from the Ministry of Labor to visit the address that was written in the SMS, but there was no office to receive the customers,” said Al-Ghamdi.
Abdulrahman Al-Jehani, head assistant of the recruitment department in the Ministry of Interior, stressed that such fake companies sent large numbers of messages in an attempt to benefit from the maids crisis. “The Ministry of Labor recently discussed the possibility of establishing specialized companies that rent maids and drivers for customers. This project is still under study and no licenses have been issued for any office. Some fake offices try to benefit from the media propaganda and maids crisis, which is why they create such fake companies,” he said.
Al-Jehani is opposed to the establishment of recruitment companies, as he believes that such steps would increase the number of maids running away looking for  higher salaries.
“Such companies will increase the number of investors in the field of maids recruitment. In addition, it would increase the number of maids who are coming to work under a company sponsorship and then escape,” he said.
Al-Jehani confirmed that there were already large numbers of private recruitment offices that bring maids and rent them for families in Saudi Arabia. He stated that these companies were already licensed by the Ministry of Labor.
The maids crisis started in August after the Saudi government decided to stop hiring Indonesian domestic workers. Indonesia also prohibited its citizens from working as domestic servants in Saudi Arabia after the beheading of a maid convicted of murdering her Saudi employer. The ban, which remains in place, increased the salary of maids and led to what they called a “maid crisis.”

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