POEA shuts down recruitment firm over alleged violations
The Philippine Overseas Employment Administration has shut down a recruitment agency for allegedly misrepresenting itself and for exacting placement fees from overseas Filipino workers deployed as domestic workers.
POEA Administrator Hans Leo Cacdac canceled the license of Valentino Promotion Recruitment International Agency Inc. in the wake of complaints by workers it deployed to Singapore and the United Arab Emirates.
Cacdac, in a social media post, said one complainant claimed a staff member of the agency promised her work as a household service worker in Singapore, with a monthly salary of 600 Singapore dollars.
But upon signing the contract, she was charged the equivalent of eight months' salary as placement fee, to be paid via salary deduction.
The OFW worked in Singapore for 15 months, with a salary of just US$400 a month or just P17,200 a month or P138,000 in eight months.
Cacdac said this "violates both Philippine and Singaporean laws on recruitment and employment."
He cited POEA Governing Board Resolution 6 in 2006 saying household service or domestic workers should not be charged any placement fees.
"The mere fact of charging or asking for placement fees warrants the penalty of license cancellation on the part of the recruitment agency," he said.
Misrepresentation
Meanwhile, Cacdac said the Philippine Overseas Labor Office (POLO) in Abu Dhabi, UAE, has endorsed the case of a domestic worker who took shelter at the OFW Center 10 days after arriving in the UAE.
The worker said she signed an employment contract indicating a monthly salary of US$400 (P17,878), but when she arrived in Abu Dhabi, she was told she would only be getting 800 dirhams (P9,734) a month.
When she refused to accept the job, the employer sent her back to Emirates Falcon Manpower Services, Valentino’s counterpart agency in the UAE. There, she was told by the agency owner to reimburse the expenses in her recruitment, and was threatened with detention if she refused to pay.
Cacdac said Valentino committed misrepresentation when it submitted for POEA processing the employment contract of the complainant indicating a salary of US$400 - which was slashed to half at the job site.
“Obviously, the recruitment agency committed such misrepresentation to facilitate the processing of the documents of the worker at the POEA with dispatch. She would not have been allowed to be deployed unless the stipulations in the contract of the worker complied with the provisions of the POEA rules on the deployment of household service workers,” Cacdac said. —Joel Locsin/KBK, GMA News
POEA Administrator Hans Leo Cacdac canceled the license of Valentino Promotion Recruitment International Agency Inc. in the wake of complaints by workers it deployed to Singapore and the United Arab Emirates.
Cacdac, in a social media post, said one complainant claimed a staff member of the agency promised her work as a household service worker in Singapore, with a monthly salary of 600 Singapore dollars.
But upon signing the contract, she was charged the equivalent of eight months' salary as placement fee, to be paid via salary deduction.
The OFW worked in Singapore for 15 months, with a salary of just US$400 a month or just P17,200 a month or P138,000 in eight months.
Cacdac said this "violates both Philippine and Singaporean laws on recruitment and employment."
He cited POEA Governing Board Resolution 6 in 2006 saying household service or domestic workers should not be charged any placement fees.
"The mere fact of charging or asking for placement fees warrants the penalty of license cancellation on the part of the recruitment agency," he said.
Misrepresentation
Meanwhile, Cacdac said the Philippine Overseas Labor Office (POLO) in Abu Dhabi, UAE, has endorsed the case of a domestic worker who took shelter at the OFW Center 10 days after arriving in the UAE.
The worker said she signed an employment contract indicating a monthly salary of US$400 (P17,878), but when she arrived in Abu Dhabi, she was told she would only be getting 800 dirhams (P9,734) a month.
When she refused to accept the job, the employer sent her back to Emirates Falcon Manpower Services, Valentino’s counterpart agency in the UAE. There, she was told by the agency owner to reimburse the expenses in her recruitment, and was threatened with detention if she refused to pay.
Cacdac said Valentino committed misrepresentation when it submitted for POEA processing the employment contract of the complainant indicating a salary of US$400 - which was slashed to half at the job site.
“Obviously, the recruitment agency committed such misrepresentation to facilitate the processing of the documents of the worker at the POEA with dispatch. She would not have been allowed to be deployed unless the stipulations in the contract of the worker complied with the provisions of the POEA rules on the deployment of household service workers,” Cacdac said. —Joel Locsin/KBK, GMA News
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