Dubai Maids –Salary Debate

Is there anything more frustrating than happily engaging a new housemaid, to find out she changed her mind 5 minutes after the visa was printed?

How long are you managing to retain your housemaid, 5 years?……..No ?

Social Media platforms are full of good threads, and many discuss the inability to retain, or engage good quality domestic staff.

For the purpose of clarity, a maid is a maid, regardless of nationality…and the definition for a Nanny is NOT maid.

Maids make excellent full time helpers if highly supervised, and frequently earn the least of what is currently being offered. A good maid commands a salary of AED1,500 

A Housekeeper ( a good multi-tasker, excellent in English written and verbal is someone skilled and productive in in time and task management. She is generally excellent organiser, and can mind map around the home, with full knowledge of all electrical appliances. She is considered productive and motivated. Her salary can also start from AED1,500++, an in general  if she has quantifiable experience, and her references stack up, salaries can range from AED2,000-AED 4,500 dependent upon the skills and responsibilities

Currently due to unethical recruitment practices and various human trafficking methods, many , many migrant domestic workers are coming here on visit visas, or change of visa status, with no qualifications what-so ever. Their only qualification is the ability to pay recruitment fees, or family members to get them a visa, and not on their educational attainment or working experience. They are severely debt burdened, and generally do not last longer than a year with the same family.

Consequently, we have a shortage of quality, amiable, interested, motivated foreign domestic workers. Most are “shop” girls who used to aspire to working in the Mall of the Emirates, however they can earn more living-in working for a “Madame”

Expat Families have contributed to the current situation by particularly offering excessive salaries for poorly experienced and unqualified “Maids ” being engaged as Nanny cum housekeepers.

 Inexperience of interviewing, no checking of credentials, and perceived high costs involved in engaging a new “maid” has resulted in “shop” girls demanding AED3,500 live in, all expenses paid, plus the visa etc etc…… little consideration is actually given to the real costs.

WE highly recommend the new ethical system adopted by the Housekeeping Co. There are no recruitment fees . The program is called Recruit-Train and Manage. For further details visit the website or call o4-706 0100