We need an Excellent Helper ASAP

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MLBW

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I need to hire a domestic helper ASAP. Below are the requirements/working conditions. If you meet the requirements or know someone who does, please PM me right away. Thanks.

Must

-Be female
-Be Christian (church references preferred)
-Speak Cantonese well
-(Able to speak English preferred--if not an English speaker, Mandarin-speaker okay)
-Have excellent ability to work with toddlers
-Be able to live in agency dormitory or outside as due to cultural and privacy preferences we wish the helper to NOT live in with us

Conditions

-Primary responsibility is to care for 15-month-old boy and help grandmother with housework and run errands
-Will spend 2/3 time in Shau Kei Wan and 1/3 time in Yuen Long as we somewhat have "two homes"
-May work 3-6 days/week, depending on convenience and what we require at the time
-Hope to pay on a per day basis + a flat monthly fee for housing/food expenses at dormitory

If you or someone you know would fit our requirements please PM me ASAP.
 
you should probably post a job with the labour department as it will be quite difficult to find someone who can legally fit all of your criteria.
 
Um, I don't know if that was meant to be sarcastic or not...kind of sounded like it.

I really don't think those criteria are unusual as we have already checked with several agencies and it is totally possible to hire a live-out helper legally--I am just broadening my search to find the right person.

As far as spending 1/3 time in one place and 2/3 time in another--that is also not unusual as most domestic helpers actually travel with the family they are working for (example: you go to the beach for the day and the helper goes with you). Some days we will be at one house and some days we will be at the other but the helper will be working for one single family.

Being female? Most domestic helpers are female. Being Christian--as far as I know, it's not illegal to be a Christian in HK. Be able to speak Cantonese--most domestic helpers can speak Cantonese (if they are working for Chinese families). Able to speak English or Mandarin (I can speak both so I need her to be able to speak one at least a little bit so I can communicate with her--again, I don't think it would be unusual to find a domestic helper who can speak Cantonese or some English--I'm not talking about fluency in English here, simply basic communication

Again, about the payment schedule--I am quite definite that it is possible to work out a payment schedule like this as we have hired a domestic helper through an agency for the past 3 weeks that works on this type of schedule--however, as far as personality goes--she was not as suitable as we'd like for a long-term commitment.

So, again, carang, I don't really see where the difficulty is coming from with my post. Anyway....
 
no, it wasn't sarcastic in the least. i'm sorry if it sounded that way.

if they are on a foreign domestic helper visa, it is illegal for them to live-out, regardless of what agencies say. that being the case, it is much more likely that you will find someone who can work in this manner, legally, if you go to the labour dept. they have a job sourcing section that can help you find someone that would suit you.

as for working 1/3 & 2/3, if you read the FAQ of the gov't immig webpage for FOREIGN helpers, it is illegal. they are to be tied to ONE place for work, for ONE family. if it was to be a one-off exception, it would be ok, but if it is on an on-going basis, it is illegal.

for your method of payment, yes, it is illegal for a FDH. you would have to find someone who is here either as a PR or as a dependent in order to pay in this manner. a FDH, is paid on a monthly basis and MUST be full-time, live-in. if this isn't suitable for you, then again, you need a PR or dependent visa holder.

for languages, that is no problem. if the person you find is from the mainland, it is more likely that they can speak mandarin instead of english. if you are ok with that, then great.

for looking for a christian female... that is up to you.

why did you take my post as a personal attack? i don't know. it was meant to be helpful.
 
*sigh* Just a misunderstanding and I didn't take it as an attack. Okay, well...I'm not talking about my helper staying with two separate families at all--I'm saying that they will have to TRAVEL every a lot--because some days I we will physically be in one place and some days we will physically be in another place. I doubt there are any rules that say "Thou must stay in one home all the time with your one helper" The helper works solely for me and since I work from home and have to travel quite a bit some days I will be sleeping in one house and some days in another.

I've met a few Indonesian helpers here who speak Mandarin because they previously worked in Taiwan. At any rate...Mandarin or English...just so I can understand.

I'll check with the labor department--however, in other business matters in the past our family has found that the labor department is not the best place to go for anything--but maybe concerning domestic helpers it's different.

There are quite a few part-timers actually working legally for agencies here. For example, they lose work because their client moves away suddenly (financial crisis) but they still have a contract with their agency and they have x-amount of time to find full-time employment before they go back to their country so in the interim the agency can also have them live in an agency-run/rented dorm and continue working on a per-day basis until they find suitable long-term employment.

Anyway....I won't keep going on. Thanks for your help and all.
 
i'm sure many agencies do that, but it is still illegal.

next to my playgroup centre is an agency, so when i was looking for someone to come to clean my centre, i naturally went there. after they sent three people for an interview, i realised that NONE of them were legally able to work for me. i had to go back and reiterate that i wanted someone LEGAL. they finally sent me a nice chinese lady, who had done the gov't sponsored re-training programme.

she then was able to get another woman to share the part-time work with her. she met the woman when they did the course.

so far, they've done very well and have been working for me for almost a year. however, they ONLY do cleaning and they don't speak any english.

for teh question regarding two homes:

"Q15: I own two flats where I used to dwell alternately. Can I enter both addresses in the employment contract?

A15: No. It is specified in Clause 3 of the Standard Employment Contract (ID407) that an FDH shall work and reside in the employer's residence at a specified address. It is also stated in Clause 4(a) that an FDH should only perform domestic duties as specified in the "Schedule of Accommodation and Domestic Duties" attached to the Contract. The employer's residence refers to a single household in one location and it is therefore not permissible to include a second address in the Contract. Please also see GR2 above."

as i said, it is illegal. that's not to say others don't do the same thing, but you should just know the law as any helper you may hire could take you to court.
 
Okey dokey then. Guess I just won't hire a helper and go another route. I absolutely do not want a helper living in my home with me and if that helper can't legally be flexible to the way our life runs (two different locations) then I guess I'm simply out of luck. Thanks for helping me out with this one---really. You've saved me a lot of time and effort.
 
i, too, don't agree with hiring illegally. i just didn't want you to think that everything was ok, then have your possible helper take you to the labour tribunal because you didn't know what was allowed.

you have to be really careful with the agencies as MANY of them don't really care if you break the law as they are not responsible, you are.

you may want to go the route of Rent-a-Mum or something like that for babysitting, if that is what you require. or seeing if there is anyone in your area that can share the cost of a proper nanny. nannies are MUCH more expensive... around $20-30K/month, but if you and a friend share the costs or even a couple of friends if you only have one child..... it might be worthwhile looking into.

or like i said, someone local or with a dependent visa.
 
Well...since we make 20-30K/month then I guess getting a nanny for that exact price won't work. And since where we live no one else has kids--and if they have kids, they also can't afford a helper or a nanny (even sharing the price), sharing a nanny won't work. Rent-a-mum is actually quite expensive and hiring a local HK person is about 2-3 times as much a month as hiring a foreign domestic helper--and it is actually rare to find a local helper who speaks English or even Mandarin as usually they come from a displaced-homemaker training program and have a very low level of education. I had a great helper who was local (a bit more spendy than we wanted but I had no choice as I've said before--my health was in bad shape and we needed someone who didn't live with us) but she has a newborn baby and is not available to work now. So, yeah...I really don't think a domestic helper is for us--we'll work something out, though.
 
good luck!

cost-wise, before we had our first, we REALLY debated getting a helper at all or a part-time, eventually it dawned on us that we would be paying more for an illegal part-time (or even a legal one) than we would for full-time.

for us, it's worked out really well. we've had the same helper for 4 years (our first helper) and we are going to hire her husband as well in the next few months and bring him here from saudi arabia (where he's been working for years).
 
Interesting. By the sound of it, your home has plenty of space to house extra bodies. Ours does not--it's just perfect for the three people in our family and we like it that way--we could move out and get a bigger place if we wanted but it's not necessary and we choose to save the extra money instead and enjoy making creative use of the space we have here. There literally is nowhere for a helper to sleep. Yeah, I just don't want to have a helper living with us...no way, no how. And when we've looked into it before, I always feel like hiring a full-time helper is like adopting an adult family member. Then after reading a lot of the posts here about helpers I feel even more that way. I don't need another child/dependent (not that helpers are children but you do bear a huge responsibility for them) in my home. To me, a helper is like an upgraded babysitter. I want them to be trustworthy and hard-working but I also want them to go home at the end of the day and have their own life several days a week (not just the one day/week that is standard here). So "I want the horse to be good but I don't want the horse to eat grass" so to speak.
 
Have you tried Caritas?
In my first year in HK, my colleague organised a helper through them. You need someone who can speak Cantonese to organise it. They are locals (some speak Mandarin) and don't cost as much money.

It's quite common though for a helper to work in two households - most of my colleagues (LOCAL) with young kids have organised somewhat similar arrangements. I'm sure it an understood practice because the helper is ONLY minding the kids at a different venue NOT cleaning the other home.

Good Luck!
 
spockey said:
Have you tried Caritas?
In my first year in HK, my colleague organised a helper through them. You need someone who can speak Cantonese to organise it. They are locals (some speak Mandarin) and don't cost as much money.

It's quite common though for a helper to work in two households - most of my colleagues (LOCAL) with young kids have organised somewhat similar arrangements. I'm sure it an understood practice because the helper is ONLY minding the kids at a different venue NOT cleaning the other home.

Good Luck!
Click to expand...

Thanks, Spockey, I will contact Caritas. Exactly, that's what I think--I think that most local families have a similar situation (whether it's on the books or not) because the reality is that Chinese families work as a unit--there is really no difference (in practice) between our household (my husband, myself and my son) and my husband's parents' household. And exactly...it's just the venue for caring for the child is different--they aren't doing double the work or anything (cleaning two different houses for example--my parents-in-law have their own helper who does that for them and she is a very long contract worker for them so there is no way they would fire her)--it's just that the grandparents spend time with my son during the week and it doesn't make sense for me to say "No, helper, you need to stay at my residence all day long with my son because that's what the law says" and not let my son go be with his grandparents. And as I am looking for someone who lives outside the house, then it's not an issue of them having two different abodes. Anyway....I will ask with Caritas. Thanks for that suggestion--it was really helpful.
 
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