Amah

An amah is a girl or woman employed by a family to clean and look after children, etc.  It is a domestic servant role which combines the functions of maid and nanny.  The term, resembling the pronunciation of "mother", is considered polite and respectful in the Chinese language when it is used to refer to a maid.  The word is common in East Asia and India.  Since the mid-1990s, it has become politically correct to refer to them as "helper."  (Wikipedia)

If only going through the process of getting a helper were that serene.

Having a helper in Singapore is quite common.  I recently heard that there are a million of them.  I mean this literally...one million.  It is quite an interesting idea.  Most expats (not just Americans) employ them.  Many of the Chinese, including Singaporean's, do as well.  Most houses, and many high-rise apartments, have a small (nix that and replace it with:  very tiny) extra room built in their residence for one.  Most of those employed are from the Philippines, followed in numbers by Indonesia.  Most live with their expat families 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.  When they sign a contract, it is for 2 years.  Families are not obligated to send their helper home, except for every two years.  They are then responsible for the plane ticket(s).  Many helpers are married and have kids left at home.  Helpers get Sunday's and public holidays off.  Employers are responsible for the medical care of their helper.  Most helper's make in the range of SG $400-700/month.  An employer also has to pay a tax to the government of SG $265/month.

Having a virtual stranger (in the beginning) come live in your house and do all of your work is an interesting dynamic.  Knowing that they left their family behind (most who have kids have come to be a helper to provide an education for their children) to work for a family is also an interesting concept (to say the least).

We are in the process of hiring one.  It can be an easy experience.  It can also be an exhausting one.  Here's what we have gone through thus far:

1.  Before one can do anything official, one must attend a class about employing a helper.  No matter what the personal relationship is in the house, you are an employer.  Since I will be doing the legal hiring (and firing, if necessary), I am the one to attend the class.  If you have a SingPass, you can do it online.  I hear it's less than 1/2 an hour.  If you do not, and a few select Americans don't (we are one due to Jeremy's job...meaning we are here because of a classified "understanding" not here on a work pass), you have to attend a once a week offered, first come first served, physical classroom for almost 3 hours.  No stress in that, other than if you don't make it to the class, everything is held up for another week.  Not a problem if you are not trying to start a job by a certain date (cough, cough).  Here is a picture of the office who teaches the class that I took on the campus of Singapore Polytechnic:

2.  You must next decide who you are going to hire.  Technically there are three ways to do this.  #1 is a direct hire from the country (this can be pricey and not clear as to their work), #2 is a transfer (this is great to use as you can get a helper who you have seen working for a friend who no longer needs their services...typically because they are moving away), or #3 you can use an agency to interview helpers who come with a list of work history and recommendations, but whom you do not personally have first-hand knowledge of.

3.  If #3 is the way in which you look, you need to settle on an agency.  It is my understanding that each helper is only connected to one agency.  My reasoning for this is because they must be available for interviews (on Sunday, their day off) and would not be able to interview in two places at the same time.  It is difficult to choose an agency, though easy enough to do so blindly.  We gave thought to agencies that received high recommendations from random people in social media groups that we belonged to.  We gave thought to an agency that a lot of expats in our employment paperwork status use.  We gave thought to an agency  that a couple of our friends use.  An agency does not only do the initial paperwork, they do the paperwork needed in case you have any issues with your helper.  Many people look for agencies that treat the potential helpers as though they are real people, not "cattle" lined up looking for work.  (No joke, I heard that term more than once.)  The agency we ended up with is located in a local shopping mall.  It had many other agencies in this mall, and in this hall.  That was an interesting experience on the Sunday afternoon that we showed up for our interview appointments.  The hall was lined down both sides with little round plastic stools in which all of the helpers who were looking for a new employment contract sat.  I couldn't figure out a way to keep my "manners" and take a picture of that, so I opted to take a picture a few days later when filling out some additional paperwork:

4.  Also, if you are doing the interviewing, you must decide what is important to you in a helper and decide what questions you will ask to go about narrowing down your potentials.  My personal list ended up with almost 30 questions.  My questions ranged from name, age, religion (to hedge potential alternate holiday requests and non-compliance to cook pork) to why they were leaving their current employer (important pathological history) and if they'd worked for an expat family before (to understand cooking styles).  We also asked for a salary expectation.  I'd already turned down anyone who was asking "top dollar" as I knew what the going rate even in our neighborhood was.  We were concerned with situational questions such as, "If the kids are not getting along with each other while we are gone, how will you handle the situation?"  Some fun things that we learned from everyone is that:  no one smokes, everyone goes to church on Sunday, several play volleyball with other helper's, many have a sister or cousin also as a helper in Singapore, and no one knows how to bake.  We were quickly able to weed through some because there was too much of a language barrier, meaning though they understood English, they did not understand it quite enough to really hold a conversation (or speak it back).  We interviewed at least 8 one afternoon at the agency.  The day prior, we'd met up with a recommendation at a local mall foyer.  After the agency, we also had another recommendation come to our house for an interview.  In the end, we felt at peace with one of the helper's at the agency.

5.  Once you decide who you would like to hire, then the paperwork begins.  The night of the interviews, after making our decision, I e-mailed the agency our choice.  I increased her salary just slightly above her current rate.  She'd requested that we pay for her toiletries and had inquired upon food.  I stated that she could eat the food in the house.  (Some families to not state this or add an extra stipend for their helper to get their own.)  For the agency, I had to provide a good, long list of documents for the agency.  This ranged from copies to passports of all members of the family, to work documents, taxes, income verification, etc.  I signed (what felt like) as many forms as you would to purchase a house.  I signed for understandings of rules, regulations, and responsibilities; an agreed upon salary; insurance choices; bonds; etc.  The agency takes care of this on both the employer and the helper's sides.  They get everything off to the Singapore Ministry of Manpower.  I had this all in on a Wednesday.  Two days later they asked for me to sign another piece of paper.  We are now at this process and waiting.  The agency is hoping to have our helper in sometime that following week.  I paid the agency about SG $950 for all of this, including two years of insurance for massive medical claims (i.e., cancer, death, etc.) and a security bond (for the positive treatment of the helper as well as security if she were to go missing.)  By the middle of this process, your head is spinning.  On a side note, the helper also pays the agency.  She must hand over two months of pay.  If she does not have this saved up, you cover the expense, and dock her pay until it is "reimbursed" to you.  One thing to be ahead on is when their work permit ends.  It must be renewed every five years.  The family who has the helper under their contract at this time is the one who pays.  It's about $1000.  The passport renewal is $250, but the helper pays that cost.  One must also think about what requests the helper has.  This was an important question during our interviewing process.  One must keep in mind that some helpers are getting $100-200 as a food stipend and some have their employer top-up their MRT card and/or pay their cell phone bill.

6.  While juggling all of this, one must get their house in order.  Equally important are the room in which they will inhabit and the schedule of work that they will do.  Each room is mandated to have a bed, mattress, set of sheets, coverlet, and pillow.  There must also be a place to place her clothes.  We currently have a mattress, pillow and dresser.  We are working on everything else (someone bless IKEA for having a store in Singapore) as well as a bookshelf for personal items.  Our helper will be staying in our "mother-in-law room" on the ground floor inside our house instead of outside in the formally designated "helper room."  However, our helper will be using the outside "helper bathroom."  Pictures to come with the picture of our helper.  The schedule is something perplexing.  Trying to figure out how to account for your time on to sheet of paper via an actual timeline for someone else to follow is complex.  A really good helper, in my opinion, is someone who can just know what to do and how to do it.  Realistically, most rely on a schedule.  After all, you are the employer, it is your house, and you do have opinions as to how things are done.  Finding the right helper and schedule, per family, is tricky.  Some employers like to micro-manage every minute of the schedule and detail of cleanliness and cooking, others just want someone to come in to take care of it, but in a consistent manner.  Most helper's are there to please you in the manner that you wish.  I am currently trying to figure out a recipe system that she will be able to understand (for example, I know which favorite recipe is in which cookbook and she does not and I will be at work...).  Oh the things one must think of.  Someone has probably written a book.  If they have not, it will not be me.  I'm still trying to keep up on the normal activity schedule, cook, and clean...like normal people.

Lastly, if you are not exhausted enough...heaven help the husband who is out of town during this ordeal.  Surely he will catch the "stress releasing" micro-bursts in real time.  Jeremy landed in from Brunei and walked in the door 15 minutes before I drove off for the "Foreign Domestic Worker" Friday night class.  He also headed back out for California the day before all the first paperwork went into the agency.  While I am grateful he was around for the interviews, there was also only 84 hours between those flights.  That included finding out that the bed frame we had, and he'd constructed, was not going to work.  Uncheck that job on his to-do list and add it to mine.

Bless us that the peace will return.  I am counting on it the first time she cleans a bathroom or cooks a meal.  May we have a comfortable, family-like/teamwork-style relationship with her.  I am counting on this as Americans tend to treat their helper's the best.  It is an interesting concept to grasp.  Her current (Chinese) employer had her sleeping with their dogs and the previous (Chinese) employer before that did not mention that they had six kids in the house.  Who wouldn't want to come to us?  We only have four and Jack is long gone!

We will introduce her to you soon!  That is, after we sign more paperwork, get her settled within the house, show her how to get to the store/school/preschool/wet market, get her school passes, start a routine,...