How well do you know your house help? Did you do a background check when you hired them? If things were to go terribly wrong, say, for instance, she steals your child, would you be able to track her down?
How about if you returned home abruptly to find your baby has been fed traditional beer, busaa ? And your house help has invited a group of rowdy drunkards who have turned your house into a drinking den? This is the scene that confronted one mother when she returned to the house unannounced.
Mrs Winny Chepkwony, a teacher, was going about her work, when she got a call to rush back home.
When she got there, the scene that confronted her was one that she would not have thought possible, even in her wildest dreams.
“To my horror, several drunken people were half walking and half dragging my drunken and wobbly house help into the house. They had been drinking, having a good time and caring for my baby in turns,” Mrs Chepkwony recalled.
And the house help, 18, in her drunken stupor wasn’t holding back. “She even confessed that they gave the baby busaa because she was hungry.”
She thought it was a crude joke but when she grabbed her baby, a stench of the brew hit her.
When she got to hospital, her doctor confirmed that the baby had been fed the alcoholic brew.
The stunned mother would later learn that the house help would go on a drinking spree every morning Mrs Chepkwony left home for school.
“I almost resigned from the job so as to take care of my daughter. However, my mother stepped in, taking care of my child from morning to afternoon, when I would take the baby back,” the mother of two other children – one in secondary school and the other in a primary boarding school – said of the 2014 incident.
Some domestic workers are heaven-sent and the families that get to meet them feel lucky to have them, and they often treat them as family. However, there are families who, when they roll the dice, it falls on rogue house helps.
A Facebook page called FindRealMe is dedicated to bringing to the fore such stories and every day, unfortunate but avoidable stories are highlighted. Stories of families that experience cruelty at the hands of the crooked house helps whose aim is to harm employers or vulnerable family members without attracting any attention have been told, but something has to be done. Some of the known rogue house helps are still at large, others appeared in court but were later acquitted.
With most of the stories being unprintable, and, if televised, viewers are usually given a discretion warning, it shows that it is time employers re-considered how they source house helps.
Other stories can be told. Take the case of Ms Loice Owendo, whose family was betrayed by a house help that had been like family.
“She had just cleared her high school education and at the time, my sister was looking for a house help. Being a relative, albeit not by blood, we asked her if she was okay to earn a living as a house help at my sister’s place. She agreed,” says Ms Owendo.
The house help stayed at the family home in Kakamega for two days before she was taken to the city to meet her new employer, who was not a stranger to her. At the time, the family did not suspect any form of malice. She was like family, anyway.
In her first week of employment, she was left in the house with another relative to help her learn what she would do. That week was good and she seemed like a good fit for the young family in the city. Ms Owendo’s sister and her husband would go to work and come back in the evening.
One day, something came up and the live-in relative had to leave the house. It was the first day the house help would be at home alone. It would also be the day that would spell trouble for the family.
‘’The first thing that went amiss was when my niece’s teacher called my sister to ask her to pick up the child because it was getting late. My sister called her neighbour who picked my niece from school. On getting home, the neighbour found the door open. Alarmed, she told my sister who came home only to find some of her belongings missing,’’ Ms Owendo told the Nation.
The house help was nowhere around the neighbourhood in Umoja, Nairobi. She had made off with two phones, all of Ms Owendo’s clothes that had been at her sister’s place, her sister’s clothes and some Sh20,000. Her mischievousness did not end there, the girl was on a mission. One of the phones that she made away with was on, and did not have any password. So, she used that opportunity to con people whose contacts were saved on the phone. Some fell for the trap, others did not.
“Unfortunately for her, when she was texting everyone in the phonebook, she reached my sister’s husband who asked to meet her before giving her the money. Not knowing who she was talking to, she blindly agreed. My sister and her husband went to meet her, but when she recognised my sister, she ran away. On the same day, she called again, and this time, my husband’s sister went alone, and she was trapped near the chief’s area in Umoja,” says Ms Owendo.
While being questioned by the chief, she divulged that she had made a friend with whom she shared the stolen money. The friend had apparently promised to link her up with another employer. Who knows, maybe, for another round of theft?
Having been forgiven, the family paid her fare back home, ensuring that the bus had left before they left the bus stage. However, she alighted before her destination, and was seen at her home four months later.
“Her short stint taught us to be careful with house helps,” said Ms Owendo.
Mrs Chepkwony’s house help fled, only to reappear three years later.
The house help, whom Mrs Chepkwony had got off the streets with the aim of shielding her from abuse, blamed her behavior on her being an orphan and on missing out on parental love.
Attending antenatal clinics
“She also pretended to be pregnant,” recalled Mrs Chepkwony, “And, I had organised for her to begin attending antenatal clinics. Little did I know it was because she wanted to avoid doing house chores. She would leave and get back to the house just before I did.”
“I learned never to trust someone I don't know and I also learned to forgive,” said Mrs Chepkwony.
Even though it was more than 20 years ago, Mrs Rhoda Lang’at remembers how she had to fire her 18-year-old house help, whom she got from referrals.
“My friend brought her to me,” she said.
With three children, then aged seven, five and three, Mrs Lang’at was a newly employed mum and her job was very demanding. While juggling her duties as a working mother, she one day drove home to deliver fresh milk that had been sent to her from upcountry. It was around 11 o’clock in the morning.
‘’When I got home, the door was not locked so I rushed in. The house was unusually quiet, which was odd because young children are very playful and jumpy. I went checking in the rooms, only to find all the three huddled together in bed, peeping through the blanket to check who had walked in,’’ she narrated.
Her house help had forced the children to bed, then went to have a chat with the neighbours’ house helps.
“I was disappointed. You would not expect a three, five and seven year-old to be in bed at 11 o’clock in the morning unless they are unwell. I chose to be calm since I was going back to work,” she explained.
Driven by urgency, the mother hit the road early the following morning for a long distance journey upcountry, even though she was a new driver. Once there, she got a relative to assist her with the children, and drove back home.
“It was a long stressful drive,’’ she recalled. “I released the house help the next morning.”
Years later, when she had another house help, she woke up one morning to find her house help saying she wanted to leave. Upon inspection, Mrs Lang’at found her clothes and those of her children in the woman’s bag. When she threatened to report her to the police, the house help apologised and left.
“The experience,” she noted, “was an eye-opener that these girls may not be what we think. Some will pretend to be nice when you are around, and unleash their true colours when you are away.”
She advises that when engaging with house helps, employers need to be clear on expectations, provide encouragement and be free to share feedback.
Importance of background checks
Background checks for domestic workers is a crucial process that is designed to assess and verify information about the person an employer is about to bring to their private space and around the family.
“It should be a courteous process with limits, such that an employer must inform the prospective domestic worker of intention to perform background checks on them, as well as within legal precincts. An employer must not coerce the domestic worker to go for medical tests or reveal their medical status, or enquire about unnecessary personal information,” says Mr Grace Machuki, the co-founder of FindRealMe, a domestic workers background database.
Grace Machuki.
Photo credit: File photo
Background checks may include verification of domestic workers identity (verify genuine ownership of ID card), compatibility test, criminal history check, work history check and medical assessment. These will ensure that an employer hires a candidate best suited for the job, have peace of mind, in addition to ensuring employers do not fuel the cycle of rogue domestic workers in households.
Before performing background checks, an employer must have a written set of requirements a prospective domestic worker must have and know where to source. Depending on employers’ needs and financial ability, an employer may decide to use acquaintances such as friends, relatives or colleagues, as references.
This is a cheaper option but should not persuade an employer to omit background checks as much as the referee may claim to know the candidate.
Placement agencies are another option that may be costly but an employer may have the privilege of acquiring a trained candidate. Similarly, an agency claiming to have performed background check should not be an excuse for employers not to do their own verification.
Once an employer has sourced and interviewed prospective domestic workers to get the best fit for the job, it is important to ensure their relationship is guided and protected by employment laws to avoid unnecessary legal suits and misunderstandings. This is done through an employer issuing a domestic worker with an employment contract that stipulates terms and conditions of employment. An employment contract may be probationary or fixed term. It must be noted that an employment contract is a domestic workers’ employment right and employers’ legal responsibility. Should any lawsuits arise, the employer bears the burden of proof.
Domestic workers rights, just like any other employers in Kenya, are enshrined in the labour laws of Kenya. More so, they are in a special category where the minimal wage is stipulated by the government. Some of the basic minimum conditions of employment domestic workers are entitled to include: 24 hours of rest after six consecutive days of working, leave days, sick leave, annual leave, maternity leave, sufficient supply of water, reasonable supply of food and housing, on a fixed term contract. Other rights include: termination notice, service pay and letter of service.
