In the last 6 months I don’t think I’ve been able to have a single conversation with my friends without discussing my “maid problem”. By now I’m sure all of them must be thinking that something must be wrong with me, since how can a single person have maid problems for such a long time. Sometimes, I wonder that too.
I have tried all types of incentives that I can think off….increasing pay after few months; bonuses for staying on for 1 month, 3 months; school fees for their kids…but nothing seems to work. I have also been offering almost Rs. 1000 more than the going rate. I know for a fact that I have brought down my standards of cleanliness a LOT! But nothing seems to work. I am still without a maid.
In my experience, higher pay only attracts all the lazy maids. Once they accept the job, they don’t want to show up on time, want to work fewer hours, or want the amount of work reduced. Or if they happen to be the hard working type - their work is just plain shoddy, and they don’t like to be told so. It’s been more than 6 months, and I have yet to find a maid who used to work like the one I had previously.
So if you have a good maid….pay her more and hang on to her. And please share what kind of “extra” things you do, that makes your maid loyal to you. If you know of any reputable agencies for maids, or professional cleaning servies for home….do tell.
Thanks,
CK.
Tags: Domestic Help, Maids
April 21st, 2011 at 2:46 pm
Thank god I’m not the only one. My husband thinks I’m nuts because nowadays most of our conversations revolve around the maid since that’s all I seem to talk about! But seriously the maids here are driving me up the wall. To be honest I’m so sick of the whole thing that I’m just doing more stuff on my own and trying to reduce my dependence on them, which, as my daughter grows older, seems to be working better than trying to find a good maid.
November 29th, 2011 at 12:37 pm
Ask me! I was at home for a while pondering over whether to quit my job and put up my feet at home. A few encounters with my maids (2 new recruits to be precise) sent me scrambling back gratefully to the corporate world. The first new recruit was hired to report to work at 7.15 a.m. The salary was negotiated for 1 1/2 hrs of work. Now two months later, she waltzs in at 8 a.m. and I am forced to hire my old trusted maid who retired on health grounds just to supervise this new maid. If you get very familiar with them they will open their woes and on quite a few occasions, I have come perilously close to being awfully late to work. One should listen to their woes, no issues about it, but what about the nervous breakdowns one suffers when the clock shows 8.05 and the bell announcing the maid has not yet rung? I have taken two wise steps. One - taken a hefty medical insurance. Two - reconciled to maids taking leave once a week.
This may be useful to some of you… in the course of a rare conversation with one of my new recruits, she enlightened me that maids preferred doing one or two extra chores but they dread the ‘khit-phit’ dished out to them by some.
December 27th, 2011 at 3:34 pm
Give your maids the same rights/holidays that you expect at your workplace and then expect the same that is expected from you at your workplace. Professionalism should be shown by employer as well. Now, unlike you, your maids generally did not get a degree or education on how to be a maid-servant…they learn their tactics from other maids. So you have to educate and inculcate the habits. Yeah it is hard work but you (that who can afford to employ a maid(s)) needs to acts as an agent-of-change for India of future.