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| FDHs can only be hired from the Philippines through a licensed recruitment agency (File) |
If you are in the Philippines and plan to come to Hong Kong to work as foreign domestic helper, you will have to go through an employment agency if:
- You are a first-time HK FDH or a former FDH who was made to return to the Philippines after your previous employment contract was pre-terminated;
- You completed your contract but decided to go home to the Philippines before your new visa was approved by Hong Kong immigration.
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| PINDUTIN PARA SA DETALYE |
All these will
apply even if your employer decided to personally work on having your new employment contract approved, and a new work
visa issued in your name.
This is
according to Assistant Labour Attache Angelica Sunga, who handles all
agency-related matters at the Migrant Workers Office (MWO) at the Consulate.
ALA Sunga admits
that some employers have the mistaken notion that they can hire a worker from
the Philippines without going through an employment agency if they worked on
the contract processing themselves.
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| TAWAG NA! |
Many employers opt
do the work themselves, thinking it would hasten the process of getting someone
from the Philippines to come and work here, and also allows them to dispense with
paying the hefty fee demanded by the agencies.
Not a few
Filipinos share this belief, and even encourage the employer who manages to get
a visa for their helper to go straight to the MWO to get the contract verified,
and obtain an overseas employment certificate (OEC) which serves as an exit
pass for the worker in the Philippines.
But this is not
so, said Sunga. “The worker who is a
direct hire cannot get an OEC in the Philippines, and we do not verify an
employment contract if the worker is not returning to the same employer,” she
said.
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| PINDUTIN DITO |
Part of the
confusion arose from Immigration’s relaxation of the hiring process during the
pandemic, when even those who were terminated were allowed to stay in Hong Kong
and move to a new employer without having to return to their home countries.
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| Sunga says the Philippine policy against direct hiring was enforced even during the pandemic |
But as Sunga pointed out, even during the pandemic, the Philippines never wavered in its stance that everyone leaving the country to work abroad has to go through a recruitment agency.
When the
employers who did the contract processing themselves approach the MWO for
verification, they are told that this cannot be done because the worker will not
be able to leave the Philippines without an OEC, and this can only be obtained
through an agency.
“We tell them to
go to an agency to complete the process,” said Sunga. “(But) somehow they will not be
paying much anymore because they had already done the immigration part.”
Sunga also passed on a copy of Memorandum Circular No 8, series of 2018, of the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration which banned the direct hiring of landbased overseas Filipino workers.
The only
exemptions cited in the law are those OFWs hire by members of the diplomatic
corps, international organizations and heads of stage and government officials
with the rank of at least deputy ministers.
Filipino residents in places where the hiring would take place are also given the right to apply for an exemption for relatives they are hiring from the Philippines, but only if the position is for non-domestic work, or as caregiver.
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| PADALA NA! |
