Maid issue : MOM came & took maid away

[carebear]

I have never heard MOM going to someone’s house to get the maid!

Your maid must have called MOM?

Did your maid give you prior notice that she does not want to work for you?
Sometimes it is better to let her go if she is unwilling to work for you.

One of my Indon maids worked for me for less than a month and said she is not comfortable working for Chinese family, and her actual intention was to come to Singapore to look for her previous employer.

After the maid agency contacted her former employer, and confirmed that they already have a new maid and did want her, she still wanted a transfer, although I tried to compromise with her.

However, I asked her to stay with me till my new maid arrived, which could take up to 3 months and she agreed. It was a blessing in disguise as my then new maid, and now present maid is a good worker.

[pat3]

We definitely did not treat her a slave. We provide her a room to herself with air-con and we did not disturb her at all nights even when my children fell sick. I wash my own car, even when she offered to assist, I turned her down flatly.


During weekend, we brought her out for lunch at Swensen, Fish & Co, Seafood restaurants and international buffet dinner. I even bought her new clothes so that she also feel happy during the lunar new year. My family including me also bought her Xmas gifts and she always received gifts / souvenirs when we went overseas. However, do you know what happened, when she left yesterday, she refused to take all these gifts. My wife couldn’t sleep and cried through yesterday night. She told me that she was very hurt and disappointed.

For your info, this maid has numerous times crying to go home because she said that we cannot says she is no good. So saying she is no good means scolding her. We have to counsel and let her understand that if she did wrong, people will say her and that did not warrant a scold but until today, I realized that she is still very conscious about this point. She always threw tantrums and until a few days, she will be back to normal and smiles all day.

The 3 MOM officers told us that my maid has sent in a letter to them in Sept 2011, saying that she did not wish to work for us and the 3 MOM officers came to interview her behind closed door and told us that my maid did not wish to work and did not specify anything specific. If we did wrong, would we be here safely to converse with you??? We will be questioned by MOM!!!

If I have treat my maid well enough, tell me how should I treat her? After 1 year with me and she still cannot work a proper meal and take care of my children which are the 2 main factors I hire her….Till now, my wife still cook for her and help her with the children as she simply cannot handle them at all. As a result, both my children are not close to her and not at all affect by her leaving.

[znzyzyzx]

Then it is a blessing in disguise for you that she has left. In fact , I feel that you should have let her leave right at the start when she wanted to leave. Why continue to keep her when she already 无心做？ she became a burden, what for ?

pat3:

We definitely did not treat her a slave. We provide her a room to herself with air-con and we did not disturb her at all nights even when my children fell sick. I wash my own car, even when she offered to assist, I turned her down flatly.


During weekend, we brought her out for lunch at Swensen, Fish & Co, Seafood restaurants and international buffet dinner. I even bought her new clothes so that she also feel happy during the lunar new year. My family including me also bought her Xmas gifts and she always received gifts / souvenirs when we went overseas. However, do you know what happened, when she left yesterday, she refused to take all these gifts. My wife couldn’t sleep and cried through yesterday night. She told me that she was very hurt and disappointed.

For your info, this maid has numerous times crying to go home because she said that we cannot says she is no good. So saying she is no good means scolding her. We have to counsel and let her understand that if she did wrong, people will say her and that did not warrant a scold but until today, I realized that she is still very conscious about this point. She always threw tantrums and until a few days, she will be back to normal and smiles all day.

The 3 MOM officers told us that my maid has sent in a letter to them in Sept 2011, saying that she did not wish to work for us and the 3 MOM officers came to interview her behind closed door and told us that my maid did not wish to work and did not specify anything specific. If we did wrong, would we be here safely to converse with you??? We will be questioned by MOM!!!!

If I have treat my maid well enough, tell me how should I treat her? After 1 year with me and she still cannot work a proper meal and take care of my children which are the 2 main factors I hire her….Till now, my wife still cook for her and help her with the children as she simply cannot handle them at all. As a result, both my children are not close to her and not at all affect by her leaving.

[MrsSeah]

Treat it as a blessing. It is better that she leave than she does something foolish to herself or your family. Hope you and your wife will feel better today.

[MadScientist]

IMHO, it is better that your maid leaves… although the way was rather abrupt.


Just move along as soon as possible and get a new one.

All the best!

[corneyAmber]

Dear pat3,


I have been through all these questioning before but never have an answer so my solution is to DIY and stop depending on this so-called help which is more trouble than help. A few things to do is:
1. reorganise the family’s priorities (look after the urgent and critical, from a spick and span person, I learn to accept a not-so-clean house)
2. invest in good appliances to help you…if you need recommendation, just ask or some already shared in the domestic help thread.
3. train your 8-year old to help in some things. It is actually better for your kid
4. outsource some stuff to part time
5. if cooking is an issue, go for tingkat…I don’t do that but I bought tingkat and put all my food in that way to ease the way to serve food…gone are days of dining in style…but guess what? we are happier… hahaha
6. simplify your life and you will find it manageable.

Honestly I am not impressed with this solution of "foreign talent" offered to us, so I don’t buy the idea. If enough people can do that, they will be obselete in no time.

Hope this helps better than trying to fight a battle that we can never win…

[carebear]

Hi pat3, imagine you want to quit your job and your employer would not allow you to… your maid not wanting to work for you does not mean you are a bad employer.

Just let this incident pass and think of ways you can sort out your presnet situation.
You may want to send your 8 year old to the after student care, and your 5 year old to a child care centre?

[kaka]

When we get a new maid, we have to sign the contract that require us to pay for air tickets/ transfer etc. If we signed it that time and agree to the conditions, we have to carry out. If we can resign from our jobs, then we will have to accept that the maids can resign too.


But IMO, even if the maid wants to leave, MOM should not take maid away without giving the employer time to sort out any logistics issue eg get a new maid, get alternative help. When we resign, we also need to serve notice. I think this is not right.

[moonee]

So this is how MOM treat employer, looks like we have no human rights.

I thought agent was to handle the situation, why pay service charge then, so looks like MOM officers are very free to come to employers hse, perhaps agent told MOM to handle? maybe maid threaten to jump or drown, btw indon or phinlippino?

[peapot]

Surprise!! MOM is so odd. Is that how they handle things?? My goodness!! Anyway, the maid must be pretty smart to be able to write to MOM. For one, I wouldn’t know the MOM address until I google for it. Number 2, who do I attention the letter to?


Pat3, I can understand what you are going through because I don’t have support at home too and that’s why I only stop at 1. Forget about what the government says about helping with more kids. Of course, some of us could follow what KSI says but you still need to do alot of outsource if you have 2 kids.

Pat3, you should write to MOM and cc the PM. They will reply you for sure!! I remembered my friend wrote to the MP about a broken railing and cc his letter to the PM. The railing was repaired straight away and they even called him after that. Talked about after sales service!!! Since this is your personal encounter, you shouldn’t miss the boat. Although, its the first that I heard of MOM bringing maid away directly. Usually only the maid agency or some kind of home for the maids that will be involved. Even the embassy won’t come to your house and take off with maid. Strange!