The concept of this article is not to shock its readers but simply to high-light modern day injustices and to explore possible answers to these problems.
I moved to Bali, Indonesia one year ago. I moved to Bali, against all the advice of my friends, to be with a girl. I knew that she was a business owner and I knew the business involved providing babysitters and housemaids for whoever needed them.
I had no intention of becoming a part of the business but over the months I couldn’t help but become interested in how it all worked. Eventually I worked with a friend to create a website and put Bali Krisna Service online. The website has been a great success, through answering emails and working closely with my girlfriend I have learnt a lot about the babysitting/nanny and housemaid industry.
As a graduate in political philosophy I see the moral and ethical side in all aspects of life. Is it fair that the average pay for a live-in housemaid in Bali is 500,000Rp a month (55 USD). Is it fair that bosses can fire workers whenever they want and not pay them? Is it fair that these workers surrender all their rights to the owner of the house and have no protection from the authorities?
The questions our customers always ask are, how can we trust the babysitter or housemaid? Do they have references? What happens if something goes missing? All the focus is on the employee. I ask the question, how can we trust the employers?
It is very hard for me, as a British citizen, to fully understand and comment on the Indonesians that hire employees. This is something unique to their culture that is not replicated in the UK (unless you are super rich). The only observations I am willing to share are that Indonesians traditionally pay very little for their staff, I know of one case where a women was being paid 350,000Rp a month for eleven years.
I can however give you two examples of unethical behaviour by expat families, one Russian and one Italian.
The Russian employer hired a cook for one week, the cooked worked very hard to provide meals for 6-8 people 3 times a day. The cook had to travel a long way (in Balinese terms) to work everyday and often worked over the agreed contract hours to complete all her obligations. Not once did she receive a complaint or have any of her food rejected. After one week the Russian employer sacked the employee and refused to pay her salary for the week (the agreed salary was 1.5 million Rp for a months work).
The second example is of an Italian employer who needed employees for his new villas in Ubud. He hired two girls and later a third. The third girl after one day was sacked and the employer demanded his money back from the agency. The Italian employer (after receiving the refund) a day later then called the third employee and asked her to come back to work at his villa, she continues to work their now (a rich villa owner, refusing to pay a small local company). After the first and second girls had worked for 1 month and 1 week the employer sacked them and only paid up for 1 month. None of the guests had complained and the employees had made no trouble.
After having many conversations with my girlfriend who is the owner of Bali Krisna Service we believe that we have a real commitment to the rights of our employees. We do everything we can to push up the salaries of staff aiming for a minimum of around 1.3 million Rp for live in staff (food included) and 1.5 million Rp for live-out (food not included). This is still low and we are doing what we can to push it up further. For our babysitters we have some considerable success, some of our employees making as much as 5 million for the month.
The fact is a well paid member of staff is a happy and hard-working member of staff. It is not right that all the suspicion is on the employees and they get the low salaries too. This is an endemic problem within the whole of Indonesia but the sentiment now is that it is changing. The era of corruption is starting to wane. I really don’t understand how people function in this country, everybody agrees that the average pay is 1 million Rp a month and the average cost of a Kos room (a one bedroom room with shared amenities) is about 500,000Rp.
I think it would be wonderful if we could get some basic rights for housemaids and babysitters in Indonesia. With the current mood of change in the air why not bring in some progressive labour laws.
I suggest a minimum wage, maximum working hours, obligatory holidays and protection against unpaid wages. It is so easy for a boss to say something bad about an employee and be believed, we must put some of the power into the hands of the workers.
The other agencies seem to only care about the money, they will force girls into badly paid jobs just so they can get the registration fee.
Made, the owner of Bali Krisna Service says ‘I know my company is the most expensive agency but I don’t care. Only my company give good salary and the holiday. I really care about all my staff I not always think about money. My staff are just as important as my customers, if I feel the customer is no good or they bad to my staff I always take back my staff and give back the registration fee’
This article is not a shameless piece of marketing for our company, it is a set of genuine observations over one year. It is my wish that I can gain back some respect and power for the raft of women that clean the villas and look after the rich locals, tourists and expats. Without these women the tourism industry would not survive. I can take this further, it is not just the housemaids and babysitters that run the tourism industry, it is the waiters, drivers, managers, cooks, cleaners, shop assistants and bell boys that support this industry. Most of these workers will be working long hours 6 days a week for around 1 million Rp a month. I call on all businesses especially the big restaurants, hotels , villa chains, malls, shops, travel agencies to increase salaries across the board.
Another issue in Bali is the young people from the other islands that come here to find jobs. They do not have any family support systems and can often receive problems from the local Balinese. The fact is when you get served a drink in a nightclub in Kuta, or you get served by a waiter in Seminyak, or your room service brings you fresh towels in Sanur, this person is more likely to be Javanese, Sumatran or from Lombok then they are to be Balinese. The other obvious problem in Bali is the sex industry, I suggest that all these women would be less inclined to enter into the sex industry if they could earn more in other jobs.
There are deeper issues surrounding the Hindu caste system and other wider issues regarding corruption and religion that I feel I do not understand well enough and am in no position to comment on. Some people in this country are considered lower than others that is why so many people have housemaids. These issues are sensitive and need to be dealt with by other Indonesian citizens.
In the future, if you think that paying 1.5 million Rp a month for a live in housemaid is too much (as many people do) I suggest you think again. Let’s improve the living standards of the Bali people and Indonesians in general.
There are two issues in this article that need to be tackled. The first is tourists and expats that take advantage of cheap labour and in some cases refuse to pay their staff. The other issues are embedded patterns of domination within Indonesian society. If there are any expat business owners or Indonesian business owners that can feel what I’m saying then please write to me with your opinions.
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