Fair compensation for domestic workers: 5 factors every employer must consider
On each working day, they leave their own families behind to care for ours, often without the same support in return.
Cleaning / Pixabay: renkilde
Cape Talk's Pippa Hudson interviews Kirsty Scully, Senior Financial Planner at Core Wealth and Chairperson of the Financial Planning Institute of Southern Africa.
Listen below:
Many of us depend on the vital support of a housekeeper who ensures our households run smoothly while we go out to work.
For many in South Africa, this is a privilege that can often be taken for granted.
However, domestic workers are some of the most vulnerable employees in the country, facing immense challenges not only in their professional lives, but also in their personal ones.
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"There are over a million domestic workers here in South Africa, which is a huge number of people."
- Kirsty Scully, Chairperson - Financial Planning Institute of Southern Africa
Scully highlights that the minimum wage for a domestic worker in South Africa stands at around R230 a day, which she refers to as "an abomination."
While the salary an employer chooses to pay may vary, she emphasises that there are several critical factors to consider when determining fair compensation.
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These include:
- Location: The cost of living is higher in cities than in rural areas. For instance, in a city like Cape Town, where expenses are steep, a domestic worker should be paid more to reflect these living conditions.
- Transport: If your domestic worker is required to travel daily to your home, you must cover their transport costs. It's unreasonable to expect them to use part of their daily wage for travel expenses, which should be paid separately.
- Experience and qualifications: A well-experienced domestic worker with specialised skills should be compensated accordingly.
- Hours of work: Compensation should correlate with the amount of work performed. The longer the hours, the higher the pay. This includes overtime, which should be factored in appropriately.
- Benefits: Are you offering additional benefits like sick leave or contributions to a retirement fund?
"When you come to look at what the minimum wage is, that is way, way, way off track."
- Kirsty Scully, Chairperson - Financial Planning Institute of Southern Africa
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