Problems with domestic worker

The correct thing to do would be to show a bit of humanity, fly her over to your place, pay for the birth of her kid at a decent hospital and let them stay with for as long as they want on your tab or even better marry her so she and the kid can become citizens.
 
Retrench her! Phone the CCMA and follow the procedure exactly as they stipulate it and save yourself any future hassles with trying to prove misconduct. She has been coming in once a week so it will be cheap and alot less hassle than dealing with any recourse from firing her.
 
purpleheart said:
Retrench her! Phone the CCMA and follow the procedure exactly as they stipulate it and save yourself any future hassles with trying to prove misconduct. She has been coming in once a week so it will be cheap and alot less hassle than dealing with any recourse from firing her.
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Should I confront her about it beforehand? Or should I keep paying her and pretending like nothing happened until I clear things out with CCMA?
 
nononono ....... lessons on mybb #1 - listen to Bio in this thread and ignore purple = profit
 
I would tell her to piss off. She will most likely take you to CCMA (there are many people in townships who encourage this in return for a bit of "commission"). CCMA will encourage you to "settle" at each stage, regardless of who is "right". Negotiate a bit, settle, pay, move on.
 
rorz0r said:
I would tell her to piss off. She will most likely take you to CCMA (there are many people in townships who encourage this in return for a bit of "commission"). CCMA will encourage you to "settle" at each stage, regardless of who is "right". Negotiate a bit, settle, pay, move on.
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How does the CCMA enforce if employer is not in the country?
 
AirWolf said:
How does the CCMA enforce if employer is not in the country?
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You can use a nominated proxy to attend arbitration etc. The hassles with not participating and getting a default judgement are not really worth the minimal cost of settling. The days paid and not worked as essentially "owed" to the OP anyway so I can't see him having to pay much (if any).
CCMA are "fair" but also so biased towards not moving cases towards the next stage, and so administratively burdensome for the employer (typically the ex employee has a lot of free time) that it's always easier, and usually cheaper, to negotiate and settle.
 
Hi, I am a labour attorney and would like to give my two cents (not to be regarded as legal advice).

Yes, what she did does justify immediate dismissal. However, as in all cases where an employer contemplates terminating the services of an employee, a fair procedure needs to be followed.

In this case you will have to arrange a disciplinary hearing. She must receive a written notice informing her of the charge that is being brought against her. I would recommend charging her with gross dishonesty.

You will have to get an independent chairperson to chair the hearing.

The fact that you are overseas should not be a problem. You my initiate the hearing over Skype. The notice must inform the employee of the date and place where the hearing will take place. This should preferably be at the workplace. Arrange with the chairperson to have facilities ready to make a Skype call.

If you do not follow a fair procedure before dismissing her, she may refer an unfair dismissal dispute to the CCMA. You will most certainly lose in this case. The Commisioner at the CCMA may award up to 12 months salary as compensation or order her reinstatement. It is therefore best to follow proper procedure.
 
sounds like shyte to me, regardless if it's true or not ...... lying cow works 4 times in 4 months and has full time employee protection :rolleyes:
 
Mephisto_Helix said:
sounds like shyte to me, regardless if it's true or not ...... lying cow works 4 times in 4 months and has full time employee protection :rolleyes:
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The fact that she is a part-time employee does not mean that she has less rights. Our labour legislation in fact offers special protection to part-time / non-permanent employees.
 
Puscifer said:
Hi, I am a labour attorney and would like to give my two cents (not to be regarded as legal advice).

Yes, what she did does justify immediate dismissal. However, as in all cases where an employer contemplates terminating the services of an employee, a fair procedure needs to be followed.

In this case you will have to arrange a disciplinary hearing. She must receive a written notice informing her of the charge that is being brought against her. I would recommend charging her with gross dishonesty.

You will have to get an independent chairperson to chair the hearing.

The fact that you are overseas should not be a problem. You my initiate the hearing over Skype. The notice must inform the employee of the date and place where the hearing will take place. This should preferably be at the workplace. Arrange with the chairperson to have facilities ready to make a Skype call.

If you do not follow a fair procedure before dismissing her, she may refer an unfair dismissal dispute to the CCMA. You will most certainly lose in this case. The Commisioner at the CCMA may award up to 12 months salary as compensation or order her reinstatement. It is therefore best to follow proper procedure.
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Thanks so much Puscifer, noted on all this. I have bad experience with managing any administrative actions or procedures from overseas. Not only because of big time difference, but also because it's hard to have an eye on everything. Perfect illustration: the reason why I found out about this situation so late is because the property manager forgot to mention this to me earlier. I just can't manage things from abroad. I would like to avoid, by all means, any procedures where I have to hire proxies to show up in my name etc. If I was physically present in SA that would be a different story.

I need to look closer at the retrenchment procedure though, thanks for the tips on that.

Also I didn't mention this earlier. Back in January the tenants contacted property manager about the issue with their private posessions gone missing (minor things: tshirts, toiletries etc) and they suspected my maid. I asked them to give her a second chance, and they agreed to this. Since this confrontation there's certain tension in their relationship, and I don't want to force my maid on them, even if CCMA orders her reinstatement.

I need to talk to my husband and we will decide together what would be best solution. My maid didn't show up to work this week either (I know that from the tenants) and she texted me that she is going on maternity leave end of April. I just counted, she was supposed to work 14 days total this year, and she failed to show up 10 times now.

So she owes me R2,500, plus she borrowed R3,000 in January.
 
Ugh... maids, always a mfing issue, growing up and visiting my friends houses i realized maids are really more trouble than good, each have their own style of making your life a special hell.

I vowed never to have a maid since, robotize everything rather as much as possible dishwashers, auto vacuum cleaners, everything you can get your hands on to make the final touches of cleaning by team husband and wife easy and pain free. Works well so far but then again we dont live in a mansion exactly.

Sorry to hear about your troubles OP, im sure after this you will also feel never again, rather give the tenants equal discount then they can use that discount to pay their own maid or something
 
Also, I just had an idea.

To solve this peacefully and avoid CCMA. I can just let her go on a 3 months paid maternity leave now, and tell her that the tenant's lease is up in July (it's true) and that the new tenants don't want any domestic help. I can't be forcing maid services on my tenants, and she should understand it. This way I avoid firing her officially, and hopefully avoid her knockig on CCMA door.

I really want to confront her about not showing up to work though, but this will most likely guarantee her going to CCMA after she's done with maternity leave.

I am quite mad that even in case like this the worker (who is the abusive force here) is protected.
 
voldoverse said:
Ugh... maids, always a mfing issue, growing up and visiting my friends houses i realized maids are really more trouble than good, each have their own style of making your life a special hell.

I vowed never to have a maid since, robotize everything rather as much as possible dishwashers, auto vacuum cleaners, everything you can get your hands on to make the final touches of cleaning by team husband and wife easy and pain free. Works well so far but then again we dont live in a mansion exactly.

Sorry to hear about your troubles OP, im sure after this you will also feel never again, rather give the tenants equal discount then they can use that discount to pay their own maid or something
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True, true. I'm learning a lot. I see how naive I was.

I was paying the maid separately, and the house rental cost wasn't higher because if this. I just wanted to help her, as I knew that her husband didn't have stable employment.
 
She properly rode the free train!

Granted it's probably peanuts in the grand scheme of things for you but the fact that she would lie and deceive you like that must hurt.

I'd get it in writing from the current tenants the amount of days she was at work and perhaps also in writing from her that she gets maternity leave and then the job is over.

I'd also just ask her straight up why she has missed 10 days, without anger or malice. Who knows she may have a valid enough reason, she may also come clean and admit her wrong doing which might give you an easy way to firing her straight away if you feel that would be justified or suit you better
 
Charge her with gross dishonesty and more importantly abscondtion which is taken less lightly than dishonesty by the CCMA.
 
Why not make it super simple, tell her her services wouldn't be needed in 3 months time. So she must be on the lookout for a new job.

Get something in writing that both parties agree to this working arrangement that would stop.

Then because she goes on M Leave, pay her the 3 months salary in advance.

How long did she work for you? Just pay extra month as bonus, so 4 months salary.

After that she can go fly a kite!
 
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biometrics said:
I doubt a one day a week job has any rights.
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Oh yeah she does, got taken to the ccma for a once a week maid for only 5 hours a day. You know how hard it is to prove that? Even with documents, luckily just ended up paying for one month.
 
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