ECQ has increased low income employee needs for a loan. So how do you handle your loan arrangement with your helper?
I usually give them, usually they ask for a month or two. I just divide the loan in equal installments @ Php500.00 15/30
This was indirectly pointed out to me. The IRR of BATAS KASAMBAHAY has a section for it SECTION 10. Deduction for Loans/Debts. –In case there are loans/debts, an agreement may be made to deduct from the wages of the Kasambahay an amount which shall not exceed 20% of his/her wages in a month.An employer may agree to extend loan assistance to the Kasambahayat an amount not exceeding the equivalent of his/her six (6) months’salary Example. So if Kasambahay has a wage of 15,000/month the employer cannot legally lend more than 90,000 or legally collect more than 3,000/month.
A caveat to that: my mother, a senior citizen with memory gap issues, was duped by her kasambahay to a loan of one-half of her monthly salary plus transportation allowance at the height of the lockdown. This was in mid-March. The maid went home to her province. My mother paid up the remaining half of her salary for March including another half for April with the intention of having the maid return at the end of ECQ. Last week, the maid again asked for the remaining April salary and half of May as a condition for her return. I am very sure she is scamming my mother already. She has no intention to return, having accepted another job as maid with another household in March. That’s where the problem lies. All those advance payments made for services supposedly rendered during the lockdown in the form of ayuda are plain and simple scams by this despicable kasambahay. Were it not for having been found out that she was working elsewhere and would’ve bled my mother dry by asking and asking her advance on the condition the lockdown ends and she could return for work are indicative of the kind of panloloko being made by kasambahays nowadays. She had been working with my mother for more than a year, have received her salary without hiccups, had SSS and PhilHealth payments (which we now stopped), and treated as a member of the household, which makes it incredulous how she could just fool my mother around in the end. Not only that; I also found out that she had bilked my mother previously for Php200K for an operation for her daughter which never happened because that girl wasn’t sick and wasn’t even with her (she was with her estranged husband). So now, the lesson I told my mother is: why give them an advance or a loan when you know for a fact they might just be fooling you?
Mm...have bad experience with that in the past. Learnt not to lend to relatives. For my kasambahays, my cook has been with the family for at least total of 15 years (interrupted by 2 years hiatus) . She owes me right now 4 months cash advance and I deduct 500 each month sometimes wala deduction. Okay naman. My other kasambahay (less than 2 years) does not borrow. Okay din. Medyo maluwag ako because ang hirap na ngayon makakuha ng trustworthy and good kasambahay. I blame 4Ps (doleout). Agency? Never.
I wish my dad was like this. He lives giving financial help to people who are very irresponsible with money or are dishonest.
With me, it depends on the situation. When our kasambahay's grandson was hospitalized, we just gave her the needed amount and forgot about it. So my rule of thumb would be "not more than you're willing to shrug off as a loss."
Hmmm with me, I only give advance worth of 2 months salary. They cannot advance again till that loan is paid. Minimum bawas is P500, so it's up to them how much.
You are very lucky to have a mom who has the gentlest of souls. Napakabait to a fault. Nakakatuwa na nakakainis na lang. Grrrr! Back when we still had our kasambahay, I kinda found it hilarious when she'd be wallowing in the incremental debts she gradually accrued only for me to forgive them in increments just the same, but only after she's been worried sick as to how to pay up for it. I was never a great collector thus oftentimes I feel obliged to forgive since it kinda makes me happy and it means the world to them, especially around Christmas time. I'm glad I was able to teach her the concept of banking so she'd have a nest egg later on as opposed to having a hand to mouth existence and not having anything to show for during her twilight years. Our kasambahay stayed with us off and on for around 24 years I think. Comes back when the going gets tough, leaves during fair weather for various "life happens" reasons and asks if she can come back when the going gets tough and opportunities outside run dry. We almost always take her back because as you guys have mentioned, it's really difficult to find reliably trustworthy help nowadays, in spite of her faults which luckily aren't as egregious relative to most. Good times!
My wife and I decided - Yes, they need our help. But when we keep lending them to the point where their debt is increasing, we're not really helping them. We're enabling them in the wrong way. It's not really them we're enabling but, in reality, their family members, especially good-for-nothing partners, siblings, and fathers who will continue to depend on our kasambahays, unfairly to them. After we learned this lesson, we set limits. Nothing more than 1 month (with some exceptions depending on circumstances). No additional debt till existing ones are repaid. "We are a source of your income, not a source of your utang," we tell them.
I loan out amount equal to their 13th month or severance pay, whichever is higher. The longer they are with us the higher loan they can get. In any off chance they “run away”, no hard feelings as they are considered AWOL which forfeits any severance benefits they may have incurred during their service with us. Simple and easy to explain and I’ve yet to experience pushback. They don’t take it personally. If they continue their stay with us, I ask them how much they want to deduct during salary time. Strictly no new loans until they pay off existing obligations. I don’t like thinking too much about “being bested” by them. At the end of the day, I’m still the one in the better position (Financially), after all.
Another thing we had to control: online shopping They would buy from Lazada and Shopee, have it delivered, and then the item was already there and they had no money yet to pay for it, so they would ask for an advance. We had to teach them not to spend money you haven't earned yet - though this is a lesson that several members of our immediate and extended families have never learned.
The biggest "loan" we granted was to a new helper a few years ago. At that time, we still provided the helpers with postpaid sim lines because we noticed that our helpers kept changing their cell numbers and it was hard to keep track. Well this new helper fresh from the province was so happy to have a cell phone and started calling everyone ... and racked up a considerable bill. Eventually it was paid with regular deductions, and she stayed with us even after that and even longer, until she got pregnant by her boyfriend and they went back to the province to get married. We also had a helper who borrowed money supposedly for her daughter's dental work during the initial interview itself. We advanced the amount, since it wasn't too big, and we assumed she really needed the money. But that raised flags already to the point that when she borrowed again before she had fully paid the loan, we said no, and told her that she had to wait until the initial loan was paid. That led to several cycles of borrowing right after the previous loan was just fully paid. We eventually asked her to go for other reasons. That's when we learned that she also had "utang" with all the other helpers and our office aides she had contact with. Our current helper also asked if we could advance her first month's salary so she could remit it to the province, but there was a major difference from the helper above: she herself said that it was just an advance so she won't be expecting to get paid anymore during the first month, and not a loan to be paid in increments. That gave us the impression that she was fiscally responsible. She is still with us and we are happy with her.
