Paying the Maid

If I'm paying all the bonuses as required by law, how is this 'too clever'? As I see it the difference is that I'm paying a little every paycheck instead of lump sum, and I have a contract instead of just a verbal agreement. I can't imagine how this could be construed as not obeying the letter-or spirit-of the law.

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding your criticism. Do you oppose written contracts?

What rights is the Maid signing away by agreeing to accept her bonuses in installments?

If the maid is your employee, under the law she's an employee and not an independent contractor. You're an immoral person who looks for ways to cheat your employees at every chance you get. You have no respect for GOD and for the LAW. You should be ashamed of yourself; remember GOD is watching you.

Dura lex sed lex. —Mark, in other posts trying to argue the merits of obeying the law in the U.S.

EIGHT: 'You shall not steal.'

NINE: 'You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.'

gringochapin/immoral gringo/gringo ignorante/zealot gringo:

Caeca invidia est!

FYI: 'You shall not steal' is actually the 7th commandment, and 'you shall not bear false witness against your neighbor' the 8th, or do you equate your neighbor's wife and goods as being of equal value? (that would be consistent with Guatemalan/Salvadoran custom, after all)

Don Cristobal, the Wife and teenagers stay pretty busy with chores and have done their fair share over the years, but it's more important for my Wife to be a good mother and teacher (we homeschool) than it is for her to clean toilets or do laundry. Similarly, it's more important for my children to study and play than to sweep floors. After all, they can do that in Phoenix, but here I can pay someone to do it, helping her support her family and helping me by freeing up time to spend on more valuable tasks.

In economics this is called utility or substitution, or in real estate it is often called 'highest and best use', meaning you don't have a race horse pull the milk wagon around town. I'll let you figure out who the race horse is here.

Hmmm…I never said I can't imagine how it is possible for a gringo to get ripped off by the system. I just said (or just meant) that I couldn't see how this particular system was ripping you off.

I agree, you can and should have an employment contract that states your expectations (i.e. job description) and the hours and pay, but I don't see why this requires labeling the maid as an independent contractor.

The only injustice I can see from the information you've presented seems to be that when someone is truly incompetent or actively steals from you/sabotages you/etc. you have no recourse and still have to pay them severance. I don't have any idea how you can get around that, except that from other people's experienced advice, it seems important to fire the person in question and cut your losses as soon as possible.

I agree that I personally would rather have the money in my paycheck (and that's why I periodically adjust my tax withholdings and rarely get a tax refund). However, if you think about the level of education (combined with the past experiences and expectations) of a typical maid, they are not going to follow this reasoning on the day they are expecting to receive their bonus. That's why I think you're better off just putting the money aside for them and giving it to them when everyone else in Guatemala is getting their Christmas bonus. Even if you have the maid sign a contract stating the bonus is being spread out in the weekly pay, it's very predictable that showing this signed statement to the maid when the question comes up on bonus day is not going to go over well.

And I say all this based on my very regular reading of your posts and other blogs, my friendships with Guatemalans who live in the U.S., and my five visits to Guatemala.

This bastard isn't even worth commenting on!

Perfect! That's what I have done for almost 40 years!

Right on Don Marco. If these poster can't understand they've either been cheating the maid's themselves, getting ripped off or aren't living here in Guatemala.

When I enter into a contract with my maids, I don't have these crazy problems. They know what I will pay them and when and what their job description is and that's it. They agree to it or they don't work for me. I am doing them a bigger service then they could ever do for me by cleaning my floors and doing the dishes and laundry.

I also pay way more than any Guatemalan (Q3500-5000 monthly) ever would and pay double on every holiday they have to work (Even USA holidays), buy them food for their families and pay for their doctor visits at private doctors offices and private hospitals (not the National hospital), so they are always happy.

And yes I do make them work on major holidays, but have never had a problem and I think it is because they are treated MUCH MUCH MUCH better when considering the treatment and pay scale they can expect from their "wealthy" Guatemalan brothers and sisters who employ would them.

Guatemala law sounds alot like Greek law as far as employment goes, my company has a factory in Greece that we are in the process of shutting down because of this very thing, these socialistic laws hurt the people in the long run because companies go elsewhere.

Korey, you've made some good points, and no one else has yet mentioned this Q250 monthly amount to me before, so I guess I need to do some further research.

Norm, one of the things that is a challenge here, at least for me, is the myriad of laws-often conflicting-that are ignored in practice. I hear about these rules/laws, and ask around, and the Guatemalans tell me they are ignored, and the expats know nothing about them, etc. It's like the sign above the guy's desk at migracion that says corruption is not allowed, or my passing the police on a solid yellow line around a bend in the road.

From my undergraduate business law classes I seem to remember that laws which are not enforced can lose the force of law. I know from philosophy classes laws which are not enforced equitably may lose the justice which they are normally assumed to have.

I'm not trying to be self-righteous here, but do I really want to be the only guy around who plays by these rules? Does that not make me another kind of target?

I don't know…I didn't move here because I wanted more moral quandaries in my life. It's tough to Walk the Line while people are trying to rob you left and right.

I'm sure that you learned US law in your business law classes. I think korey says it best when he suggests you hand this all over to a Guatemalan accountant. Lawyers are there to find mistakes/loopholes/justifications not really to tell you the best way to go about employing someone.

Lisa has said it far better than I am able. A contract is a good thing if it is a legal contract, we have people here in the states who want to call their employees independent contractors and they get fined by the government all the time. Calling an apple an orange is fraud if your trying to get around the law. Put the money in an escrow account and pay it when it is due. If you try to play the system in a place like Guatemala by being clever, the system will eat you alive. What is your liberty worth? It goes back to the 70% standing, you will not get a fare shake in any dispute you have with a local, avoid disputes that the courts might decide.

I have always hired my maids with a contract. Of course my maids can read and write, which isn't common here in Guate among the maids (remember literacy is about 69.1%). I have never had a problem before. If they can't read they can't be hired…that will save you a lot of problems. Once entered into the contract, that's it and they know it. I had one try to sue me once and that ended very quickly with the presentation of the contract to their attorney. Was this the law? Seems to me some of these posters don't seem to think so, but it worked.

I couldn't care less what the maids think to be honest with you after they have signed the contract. I make them bring THEIR attorney with them to review the document before they sign.

"Pay them what the law dictates in the local manner…" You can't be serious with this statement Norm. These are two completely different things. What the law dictates is VERY OFTEN not what is part of the local manner. If you haven't realized this yet, perhaps YOU need to go back and review the law and what is reality then you too can, as you say, "sleep better at night." This way when you have a maid that tries to screw you over, you can fight it.

Silly man. You know nothing of law here. The fact is there is really no law. Everything is bent and twisted. The policy you know of is nothing like what goes on here.

I think the contract is a good idea if you were in the States, but I think this would be a a cultural thing that would not translate into Guatemala. There are too many things in their mindset and upbringing. I'm not saying that they can't understand a contract, but when La Economica comes out with an add telling them to spend their bono 14 on a new stereo, or they are thinking about buying Christmas presents that of course they haven't budgeted for because they've been trying to eat all year, they are going to forget really quickly. It will build resentment towards you for having "tricked" them into not getting a bonus. They will forget that their wage is higher than everybody else's doing the same job.

Also, their family members won't understand either. The whole family will know how much they make per month, tell all of their friends how much Marco is paying maids (10% higher than everybody else) and you will have the unintentional consequence of not only setting yourself up to get taken by everybody else, but of raising the accepted monthly salary of all maids in Antigua.

I think the best route would be to pay the fair, accepted amount and make your budget to include those extra expenses.

I do think a contract would be good for other aspects of home life, ie a gardener that comes once a week to chop your grass or an albanil renovating a new bathroom, but for a maid that comes every day and knows how much she is supposed to get, you would be better off just paying like everybody else does.

1) Take the amount of money you want to pay (upwards of that 1,000 q)and compute a per hour wage. Compute the annual wage. Now deduct from that "fair"annual salary , the bonos, vacation pay, holidays etc……THAT is their salary and have a contract.So the salary has all those extras' already accounted for. And you are paying it back in. Still you will be paying better than most Guatemalans would pay them.Pay the bonos, etc., everything extra, separately. We pay by check AND get a receipt. But at least get a receipt.

2) To set a "fair" salary ask around. There is also some sort of office in Antigua that has salary data…and there is a book published each year by the Guatemalan govt…..ours from 2007 is : Decreto Numero 1441, Codigo de Trabajo available in bookstores after the first of each year…use it in your Spanish lessons or sit with a dictionary.Light bedtime reading….puts you right to sleep, but that is where you will find current laws governing employment. Prense Libre publishes salary data each year as well, but best to ask around your area where you are living once you have done your legal homework, "What do YOU pay a ninera, criada, gardeninero or whatever"….it varies from area to area.

If you do it that way , you will feel you have done the just thing: Paid the going local rate .You will come up with a range, quite a wide one…we pay near the top, but we also require good work, on time performance and honesty.It takes about a month to break in people that we are serious about time. We never ask anyone to work overtime w/o pay (that hourly amount) but we will not tolerate tardiness. The first late day they get a warning…the second late day a sterner, less friendly warning (our other employees tell the person we are not kidding but they simply cannot believe people would really be strict about time). Then we tell them the next time you are late more than 5 minutes we will deduct 15 minutes from your pay. If you are more than 15 minutes late, we will deduct an hour and NO, you cannot stay a little later to "make up" the time. We fell into that one early on, but have since gotten away from it, as we often have early am appts and we have only one worker with a key to the outside gate (NO ONE has a house key.) If we died in our sleep our heirs would have to hire an iron worker to cut their way into our house (or maybe a twelve year old boy with a crowbar).

And yes, those Guatemalan workers are well worth all the bother. We respect them, don't baby them or overwhelm them with goodies or gifts (had to learn that one the hard way) but treat them fairly. We have never had an employee voluntarily leave us, so they must like how they are treated/paid.

Happy Days!

Mr Harold is right. Just to put this in perspective, an entry level accountant makes about Q2,500 / month. Q5,000 / month? You could hire a food scientist to cook for you, a civil engineer to do your gardening and a chemical engineer to polish your silver. And they wouldn't even have to do night shifts. As for working on major holidays, this is "pan nuestro de cada dia" for most professionals.

Pretty strong words for someone whose own blog is password protected!

I think you are being extreemly unfair to the Koreans.
Everybody knows that the best technique is to break a person down completely and rebuild them how you want.

The primary exmples of utilizing this practice are th US Army, British Army, The CIA, the Kabiles and the list goes on.

The Koreans have simply take these successful techniques and applied them to the local workforce and God knows, they certainly need it.

Estoy mas o menos de acuerdo con Q&A. No creo que los chapines seamos mas faciles de ofender que mexicanos, guanacos, etc. Lo que molesta es la forma torpe en que la gente dice las cosas. A mi me parece que Mark esta tratando de hacer lo correcto, que es mas que muchos chapines intentan. Preguntele a una mujer si prefiere trabajar para un gringo o para un chapin. Parte del problema de estos expats es que no tienen la costumbre de tratar con ayuda domestica.

Que bueno. Gracias por tu comentario. Exactamente!!

tratando de hacer lo correcto?, ok. ¿cuanto cobra una maid en usa? y que se le da: prestaciones, beneficios, horas de trabajo, tipo de trabajo, aún así puede demandar si las condiciones de la casa no son las adecuadas.
bien, en guatemala la gente explota a la gente, ¿donde no?, se hacen los pantalones aquí, en filipinas, en china PORQUE LA GENTE GANA MENOS QUE EN LOS USA, Y NO EXIGEN CONDICIONES DE TRABAJO. O sea, no se pueden quejar porque no tienen baños, no los dejan sindicalizarse, pero no son los de aquí, son los de allá.
¿cuanto costaría vivir en un suburbio como antigua?, más de lo que tienen, yo viví en Beverly Hills, y se lo que cuesta esa vida.
que rico, venir como expat, ganar bien y tratar de pagar poco. las "quejas" acerca de como trabaja la sirvienta son rídiculas "se va antes de la hora" ¿acaso le está pagando salario mínimo?, la señora que limpia mi casa llega 45 minutos diarios, solo a limpiar y le pago lo que él dice que paga : 800 quetzales, no llega sabado ni domingo, no cocina, no lava la ropa , solo llega a limpiar, yo tengo manos y cocino y lavo la ropa. yo pago por resultados no por tiempo y ella está contenta.
¿al país al que fueres has lo que vieres?. claro, si la gente de aquí explota a la gente, porque yo no? aunque me llame cristiano. prefiere llevar un juicio que pagar lo justo.
finalmente ¡maid number 5!. ufff, eso no dice nada bueno del patrón, ¿como es que 5 mujeres no lo han dejado satisfechos con su trabajo? o no sabe seleccionar o pide más de lo que la gente puede dar.
¿por que me enojo?, bueno ¿que pasaría si yo intentara llegar a los USA y pagar menos del mínimo a mi empleada doméstica?, pues simple, me voy a la cárcel, pero como pueden ser impunes aquí, no les importa, total, no es su país y así lo hacen todos ¿que tan cristiano es eso?,
y mi blog no tiene password, sayuam.blogspot.com

The bottom line is if people agree to something, then don't bitch about it when you're called to task for not living up to your end ("las "quejas" acerca de como trabaja la sirvienta son rídiculas "se va antes de la hora") if the "hora" was agreed upon, so be it…I doubt the maid will say "I can do this in 4 hours vs 8hrs and want to leave at noon" and get paid half…They'd rather stay the extra time even if trying to appear busy and get a full day's wage – as per the agreement.
At least we have some common ground in that I'm also a lesbian, albiet trapped in a man's body.
salud!

I learned a long time ago to make sure all bases are covered and if they try to sue, bring their attorney back with them and remind them they were at the contract signing when the maid their representing was hired. They quietly walk away everytime, with nothing in their pockets.

That "nictwalls" is so ridiculous, he's not worth commenting on either.