Changes in the Saudi job market

Something’s afoot and legitimate recuiters are now in a high state of anxiety over it.

Licensed recruitment agencies deploying workers to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia recently received notice that they would now have to deal with Saudi agencies as counterparts in the recruitment process in contrast to the original practice of dealing with the Saudi government in getting visas for workers.

This new policy has a direct impact on the hiring process as it adds another layer to workers’ recruitment. Unlike in previous weeks when most of our workers don’t even have to pay placement fees to local recruitment firms, this new visa policy means Saudi recruitment agencies can ask for a cut of the action. This new visa rule may have been prompted by the anticipated construction boom in the Kingdom, particularly as new cities are on the rise, that would require hundreds of thousands of skilled workers imported from abroad, mainly the Philippines.

In today’s Manila Bulletin, Vic Fernandez, president of the Philippine Association of Service Exporters, Inc., described the new visa process thusly: “This new rule from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will force local agencies to course their new job orders with these recruitment agencies based in Saudi Arabia and pay additional costs for their services.” Foreign principals used to go through the Saudi Chamber of Commerce and the ministry of foreign affairs for the visas of hired workers. The visas are issued in the name of the local agency that processes the visas with the embassy in Manila. With the new rules, a local agency has to pay the Saudi agency a fee ranging from $100 to $200 per visa. Saudi employers will not be issued the visas for foreign workers unless there is an agreement enforced between Manila-based and Saudi-based recruitment agencies. The new rules may lead to additional costs for the departing OFWs unless the employer or local agency decides to absorb the costs — a philantrophic act that only a rare breed among them would be willing to do.
Based on experiences with foreign agencies in Kuwait, Lebanon, and Taiwan, etc., it is always difficult for local recruiters to find a counterpart that has compassion for Filipino workers and respect for the rules of the labor-sending government. It is this “broker system” that often destroys a job market only because placement fees go up, the temptation to go around the process thus aggravating illegal recruitment practices also sets in. On the losing end is the prospective OFW – especially if the local recruitment agency becomes subservient to the foreign counterpart because the latter controls the visas and are officially recognized by the host government. Thus, even in welfare cases, unscrupulous Saudi agents can also manipulate the process, trading off runaway maids with other cohorts as being done in other Gulf countries.
What I have cited are facts of life that most people in the overseas employment sector know about. Paging the DFA and DOLE. While Saudi agents talk business, the Philippine government must now talk workers’ welfare as well as recognition of and respect for our own rules.