Ministry of Human Resources : New changes to the domestic labor system in Saudi Arabia

The Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development revealed that the domestic labor system is currently under review. This was explained by Sattam Al-Harbi, Deputy Minister of Human Resources, in press statements to Bloomberg Agency, while experts indicate that the sector includes more than 3 million workers of various nationalities, and at the same time the ministry seeks to expand Countries being recruited from to increase competitiveness and reduce costs.

 According to Al-Harbi, the initiative to improve the contractual relationship, the details of which were announced recently, has been worked on for a full two years in order to raise the efficiency of the labor market and reduce unemployment among Saudis, as well as reduce labor disputes, which are mostly related to salaries and long working hours.

The total domestic workers in the Kingdom at the end of the fourth quarter of last year reached 3.69 million workers, compared with 2.45 million workers in the same quarter of 2018.

The number of female domestic workers jumped by 41.3% by the end of 2019 year on year. Their number reached 1.17 million workers, compared to 826.9 thousand at the end of 2018. The remarkable increase came with a clear increase in the category of drivers by 54.3%, equivalent to 710.68 thousand workers. To reach a total of 2.02 million drivers at the end of the year, compared to 1.31 million at the end of 2018.

The Minister of Human Resources recently issued a decision to resume work with contracts to mediate the recruitment of electronic domestic workers, starting from 7/10/2020, and the decision stipulated that the recruitment period for new contracts would be 120 days. In the event that the licensee delays the recruitment of the domestic worker during that period, the contract will be automatically extended for an additional 30 days, with a delay fine of 15% of the contract value, and in the event that the domestic worker does not arrive after the expiry of the 150-day extension period, the contract is considered null and the licensee is obligated to return The value of the contract to the customer with a delay penalty of 20% of the contract value.