KiasuParents - Parenting in Singapore

Hi All,

Our maid had been with us for coming 2 years. We will be shifting to America as my husband is working there and we have the intention of bringing her with us.

May I know how should we go about it and what is the chances of approval ? As I had read from other forums that the chances of bringing Domestic Helper with us to USA is ZERO.

check the us embassy website under visa.

a piece of advice from me (i took mine to uk) - make sure you follow the rules (like minimum wage, day off, hr of work etc) and not break them.

the relevant govt / non-govt agencies who look after these people will be knocking at your door faster than you could blink your eyes if they hear of any abuse.

maybe disappointing you, the chance is zero.
i am from hk. three years ago i lived happily with my family and a well trained maid in hk. suddenly my hubby's company shifted him to US. at that time my younger one was only 6 months old. i strongly wanted my maid to go with us. i checked against the admission criteria of US and tried to ask when i went thro the embrassy and they said provided the maid was in no relations with us, the chance was almost zero.
i lived in US for 2 1/2 years. at first i was so exhaused looking after 2 kids with endless housework and errand to run. but i would say its good that we didn't bring along with a maid. needless to say you need to provide holidays, wages according to the US labour law, the other thing like arranging her to help grocery shopping, letting her send money back to her country, letting her make her own friends there.... all are difficult. if you are not living in cities like ny with good public transport to and from your place, your maid will need to drive, and that is another issue that she can go thro the driving test there. there will be so much problems and inconvenience so you really may not want her anymore.
though without a live in maid, in US there are a lot of house cleaning services. last time i arrange one to come every week to clean the house and their charge is ok. of course those grocery shopping trips, meal preparing, fetching kids to and from schools, sending them to enrichment classes... will be all done by myself. but life in US actually quite good and we always have sweet memories back there.
what city are you going to stay? for how long? my two cents is to make sure you and your hubby have valid driving license. and you may want to look for used furnitures or electronic stuff in your area, try the craigslist.com and ebay.com for buy and sell fun.

It is true. The chance is zero, but you can manage it. We did. I even did my own confinement for my 2nd child w/o helper.

Hi All,

Thank you for your advise.

As far as I know, the chances are ZERO.

LKVM wrote:

gumiho wrote:Hi All,

Thank you for your advise.

As far as I know, the chances are ZERO.

Yeah unless you wanna adopt her

Hahaha... Wat a joke !

When you go to the US, you will find that people do not have a maid unless they are quite rich (especially with the minimum wage laws).

On the other hand, there are plenty of services to help working parents. You can get a nanny that comes during the day or at night, but doesn't live with you. Unlike Singapore, there are tons of people willing to babysit (especially high school students who want to make a little extra money) since there is a big demand for babysitting services. However, they come to watch the kids-- not to clean your house or do laundry etc. Cleaning services are readily available, and most working parents put their kids in daycare or after school care (a full-time daycare in the US costs $900-$1200 USD per month... and that's a daycare that doesn't even have to teach anything, just watches your kids for you).

But really, for the most part, people in America do their own housework after they get back from work. It's more economical than paying others to do it when you have to pay at least the minimum hourly wage.

I have to admit, I was pretty shocked to hear that maids here only get to take home $450/mo. It's no wonder there are so many people with maids as it is more economical to have one than it would be to have a bunch of services do these things for you. In contrast, in the US, a live-in maid can pull in as much as $25-30k USD per year.

ExpatMom wrote:When you go to the US, you will find that people do not have a maid unless they are quite rich (especially with the minimum wage laws).

On the other hand, there are plenty of services to help working parents. You can get a nanny that comes during the day or at night, but doesn't live with you. Unlike Singapore, there are tons of people willing to babysit (especially high school students who want to make a little extra money) since there is a big demand for babysitting services. However, they come to watch the kids-- not to clean your house or do laundry etc. Cleaning services are readily available, and most working parents put their kids in daycare or after school care (a full-time daycare in the US costs $900-$1200 USD per month... and that's a daycare that doesn't even have to teach anything, just watches your kids for you).

But really, for the most part, people in America do their own housework after they get back from work. It's more economical than paying others to do it when you have to pay at least the minimum hourly wage.

I have to admit, I was pretty shocked to hear that maids here only get to take home $450/mo. It's no wonder there are so many people with maids as it is more economical to have one than it would be to have a bunch of services do these things for you. In contrast, in the US, a live-in maid can pull in as much as $25-30k USD per year.

I am sooooooo tempted to make a comment here, but shall desist for fear of being pummeled into the ground by irate maid-loving SG mums.......

I have to admit, I was pretty shocked to hear that maids here only get to take home $450/mo. It's no wonder there are so many people with maids as it is more economical to have one than it would be to have a bunch of services do these things for you. In contrast, in the US, a live-in maid can pull in as much as $25-30k USD per year.

Please note that the foreign maids who work in Singapore are unskilled workers. I have encountered maids who cannot cook, cannot clean, and cannot even take care of babies or toddlers. I even had an ex-filipino maid who claimed she had university degree, but could not communicate in English to me. Do you think that these maids deserve anything higher than $450 a month ?

Please bear in mind that the quality of maids here is very different from those working in USA.

tamarind wrote:

I have to admit, I was pretty shocked to hear that maids here only get to take home $450/mo. It's no wonder there are so many people with maids as it is more economical to have one than it would be to have a bunch of services do these things for you. In contrast, in the US, a live-in maid can pull in as much as $25-30k USD per year.

Please note that the foreign maids who work in Singapore are unskilled workers. I have encountered maids who cannot cook, cannot clean, and cannot even take care of babies or toddlers. I even had an ex-filipino maid who claimed she had university degree, but could not communicate in English to me. Do you think that these maids deserve anything higher than $450 a month ?

Please bear in mind that the quality of maids here is very different from those working in USA.

not everyone follows the minimum wage in usa. there are thousands of mexicans (the worst treated people) and other foreigners getting peanuts for the work they do (especially the domestic workers and labourers).