The Filipino Household Service Worker (HSW) who ran away from her employer is being probed by Dhahran police.

“The police will get in touch with the employer of the worker. The HSW will be endorsed to the Saudi Social Welfare Administration (SWA) If the employer doesn’t want to issue her an exit visa,” Labor Attache Alex Padaen told Arab News.

The 27-year-old HSW had earlier called Arab News to seek for help, without mentioning that she had decided to run away because she could not cope with her job, which obliged her to clean a three-story house, wash clothes and look after a baby.

She asked a limousine driver to drop her off at a Philippine school, where the police picked her up.

The labor attache said that while the POLO-ERO is monitoring developments on the case, it’s not directly involved in processing paperwork for the repatriation of the HSW to the Philippines.

“The rules changed after the crackdown on illegal workers last year. However, we, at the POLO-ERO, monitor the developments on the cases involving Filipinos,” he said.

Before the crackdown, run-away HSWs sought help from the POLO which provided them shelter, as well as food, while welfare officers got in touch with the employers to know if they were still interested in keeping their employee. If they are not, they were asked to issue an exit visa.