Employment agency fined S$78,000 for advertising maids on Carousell
SINGAPORE — An employment agency that advertised foreign domestic workers on online marketplace Carousell as if they were merchandise was fined S$78,000 on Tuesday (April 30).
The penalty for SRC Recruitment, which still runs a website touting the largest collection of online maid biodatas in Singapore, was significantly higher than the S$20,000 fine its employee received after coming up with the idea and executing it.
In pressing for the high fine, prosecutor Vala M from the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) had argued that the case concerns an employment agency that knew the rules and regulations governing the advertisements of foreign domestic workers, yet went ahead to commit the offences.
SRC Recruitment, which was located in MacPherson, was convicted of 45 charges under the Employment Agencies Act last month. Ninety-nine other similar charges were taken into consideration during sentencing.
The bulk of SRC Recruitment’s convicted charges were for insensitive advertising, which includes presenting the workers' biodata in a manner that casts them in an “undignified light”.
The company had allowed its employee, Erleena Mohd Ali, to post the biodata of 49 Indonesian domestic helpers on Carousell for prospective employers to view and choose, and even compare prices, under the username “maid.recruitment”.
When a worker was selected, Erleena would change the worker's status to “sold”. She also used terms such as “reserved”, “collection” and “condition” in her posts.
Her boss, SRC Recruitment’s key appointment holder Koh Seng Yeow, was the one who gave Erleena permission to post the biodata on the platform, the court heard.
On Tuesday, Ms Vala said that the act of posting photographs of domestic workers on Carousell was akin to dealing with them as a “commodity”, pointing out that the way the maids was listed is “no less than an abuse, not physically but one which affects the individual mentally”.
“To be priced, with personal details and photos left for the public to view as a commodity to be bought is absolutely degrading,” Ms Vala added.
In a press release sent after the sentencing, MOM said that it has served SRC Recruitment a notice of licence revocation earlier this month.
