Our first maid Siti has always been in contact with Meimei and Mama. She had just finished a 2 years contract with another employer and was back in Indonesia. She didn’t extend her contract as her current employer was not willing to give her 2 weeks home visit.
Because she has been conversing off and on with Meimei, she sounded out she would like to come back to work for us. Meimei immediately jumped at the idea as we couldn’t take Emi no more. But I was cautious that she may be using us to come back to Singapore before jumping to another employer yet again. We made sure it was 100% clear that we would not allow her to transfer before her 2 years was up.
It's important we set the expectations right and make sure Siti knows we are having to spend a lot to hire her. We are giving up the agency fee we paid to bring in Emi and potentially incurring as much to bring her into Singapore. Plus Emi still has a month to go before she clears her loan, which we already paid upfront to the agency. That's money down the drain too.
A lot is riding on Siti owning up to her commitments. To her credit she offered to pay her own flight to Singapore. While I'm sure she thinking about not having to pay the agency several months of commissions, it is still a nice touch to show keenness. So it's up to us to see how we can bring her into Singapore.
Naturally the first step we took was to check with our current maid agency to determine how much it cost. And it was a shocking amount. It would cost us $2.6K for the agency to help bring in a maid. They cite that this is without a loan burden for the maid and engaging an agency helps to ease the immigration entry at both the departure and entry customs.
Hmmm ... it doesn't sound right. Singapore isn't like other countries. The rule of the law is strong here and procedures are nicely set out and freely available 24/7 on the Ministry of Manpower website. Why do we have to pay such a hefty sum to bring in the maid? I was expecting a couple of hundred as administrative fee ... not the $2.6K.
Meimei and I both agreed we were not going to pay this no matter what. We'll either live with our useless maid or try to bring in Siti on our own. So that point on, Meimei began her research on how to get Siti back as our maid. It's now about saving that $2.6K ...
It's important we set the expectations right and make sure Siti knows we are having to spend a lot to hire her. We are giving up the agency fee we paid to bring in Emi and potentially incurring as much to bring her into Singapore. Plus Emi still has a month to go before she clears her loan, which we already paid upfront to the agency. That's money down the drain too.
A lot is riding on Siti owning up to her commitments. To her credit she offered to pay her own flight to Singapore. While I'm sure she thinking about not having to pay the agency several months of commissions, it is still a nice touch to show keenness. So it's up to us to see how we can bring her into Singapore.
Naturally the first step we took was to check with our current maid agency to determine how much it cost. And it was a shocking amount. It would cost us $2.6K for the agency to help bring in a maid. They cite that this is without a loan burden for the maid and engaging an agency helps to ease the immigration entry at both the departure and entry customs.
Hmmm ... it doesn't sound right. Singapore isn't like other countries. The rule of the law is strong here and procedures are nicely set out and freely available 24/7 on the Ministry of Manpower website. Why do we have to pay such a hefty sum to bring in the maid? I was expecting a couple of hundred as administrative fee ... not the $2.6K.
Meimei and I both agreed we were not going to pay this no matter what. We'll either live with our useless maid or try to bring in Siti on our own. So that point on, Meimei began her research on how to get Siti back as our maid. It's now about saving that $2.6K ...
So lo and behold ... Meimei actually did it! And it cost not more than $500. $500 vs $2.6K ... imagine the margin the agencies earn just to fill up a couple of forms on your behalf. I'll share how Meimei did it in the next post.
We brought in Siti a day after letting the useless one go. It's been a month now and the efforts are totally worth it. Siti is just as capable as when we first had her 2 years ago. Mama was able to go back to Indonesia for a break without worrying about Meimei and OO. We just hope she will stick around and at least complete her 2 years contract with us. If she can stay longer that'll be perfect but well ... we are keeping ourselves grounded for now.
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