If a Smart Helper is hired under a verbal contract, is the employer bound by the verbal agreement?
A contract of employment is an agreement between the employer and the Smart Helper that sets out the terms and conditions of employment. The agreement can be made verbally or in writing. Both parties are bound by the terms of the agreement, provided that it does not violate any provisions of the Employment Ordinance (Cap. 57).
Conditions of employment for foreign domestic helpers - A general guide to the employer (ID(E)954)
Can I employ an FDH who is now in Hong Kong and whose contract has been terminated before it has run its course?
Where a contract is broken before it has run its course, the FDH will not be allowed to change employment in Hong Kong save in exceptional circumstances (e.g. when the previous employer is unable to continue with the contract because of external transfer, emigration, death or financial reasons; or there is evidence that the FDH has been abused or exploited). If he/she wishes to take up another job here, he/she must return to his/her place of origin and apply for the appropriate visa directly to the Director of Immigration either by post or through you.
Can I employ an FDH who is now in Hong Kong and whose contract has been completed in full?
Yes, provided that he/she submits the application to the Immigration Department within four weeks prior to the expiry of his/her existing contract. He/She will normally be required to take a home leave before returning to Hong Kong to start a new contract. If circumstances do not permit the FDH to take home leave immediately upon expiry of the old contract, subject to your mutual agreement with the FDH, he/she may apply for an extension of stay to defer the home leave.
Who is responsible for assessing whether a person is eligible to employ an FDH?
The Director of Immigration will assess the eligibility of the applicants as per the criteria given in the Guidebook. Those who are considered ineligible may request reconsideration through the channel provided in the written notification.
Domestic Helper Blockchain Database Research Proposal (Amanda)
When hiring a new FDH, employers can request to see the credit report from the FDH before they make a decision. This process is similar to how TransUnion deals with our credit data.
Data managing procedures of similar projects like TransUnion and UK's Higher Education Achievement Report (HEAR) will be taken reference of.
To motivate FDHs to upskill themselves (e.g. childcare and elderly care) by making training courses more accessible to them. The courses are offered by authenticated partnered training schools. All training credits and course training details will be validated by recognized training centres and supplemented the FDHs' resumes in the BDB to further assist employers' recruitment decisions.
The project would improve social harmony because online comments that spread hatred are normally 1. Anonymous and 2. Subjective. Our online sealed reference letter system requires reviewers to leave their name, and our guided questions would help them leave more objective reviews. This would help reduce the subjective comments spreading hatred in social media.
By making caregiving training courses more accessible, FDHs benefit from being upskilled, employers benefit from better services, and the public benefit from less public healthcare spendings when FDH can provide better childcare and elderly care. FDHs would be incentivised because training credits will be recorded.
Thus, some individuals and organisations (e.g. Legislative Council member Mrs Regina Ip in 2012, Support Group for HK Employers with FDHs in 2018 and Legislative Council member Mr Michael Tien also in 2018) have been urging the government to set up a database to store relevant information about FDHs.
However, the idea has not been put into practice because of privacy issues under the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance (Cap. 486). Information generally cannot be disclosed without consent of the data subject.
Currently, employers would write their reviews in forums and Facebook pages. However, there are three major issues with this method:
Privacy issues: Information that employers expose might constitute an infringement of the privacy of the FDH under the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance (Cap. 486).
Inaccuracy of information: Employers often give anonymous, subjective and irresponsible comments. It spreads hatred between FDH and employer crowd.
Low availability of FDH background and review information: Information are scattered everywhere, in different forums, social platforms, Facebook groups and web pages. It is extremely difficult for potential employers to check the employment history of a specific FDH.
Our proposed system offers the following benefits:
No privacy issues because information will only be shown to people who are authorised by the FDH themselves.
More accurate and comprehensive information : FDH's education/training data and employment history will be verified by respective parties using smart contract (blockchain technology). All the information is stored in BDB, which is tamper-free and accessible with FDH consent. More objective reviews will be made like sealed reference letter with guided questions.
Information will be stored in one online database system. This ensures availability of the stored information.
Q: Please specify at which point(s) the employer reviews on the FDHs will be conducted. Besides, please explain how the proposed project ensures the objectivity of the employer reviews apart from using guided questions.
A: Once an employer and a FDH register their accounts and establish a relationship on the platform, employers can write a concise review for their FDHs in a fixed period of time, say every three month or half a year, until the contract expires or the working relationship ends. The employer can write a more comprehensive review when the contract ends. [I thought about this method as well.]
The objectivity of reviews will be ensured or strengthened by the following two ways:
Employers are required to show at least one channel(s) of contact (phone nos, emails, social media, or Facebook accounts), if they choose to show and record their reviews, and in this way, they will tend to be more responsible in their words. This approach is similar to that of requesting a reference letter from referees for applying a university programme or a new job.
Employers can choose whether they will let their FDHs see their reviews or not, which is also same with the current practice of seeking reference letters from students in applying university programmes.
No matter the FDHs can see their reviews or not, the FDHs can decide whether they want to show the reviews for a particular job to the new potential employers or not. However, a new employer might know that such references exist but are not available or just partially available, depending on the permission from FDHs.
In the meantime, the previous employers can also opt for whether they would like to show their reviews to the new employers or not. To shed some light on this approach, the former employers might have three options of releasing their references as their choices:
Automatic approved,
Judge on case-by-case basis,
Automatic declined.
If there are things that the current employers do not want to write down explicitly, they can allow further communication with the new employers via the contact method given.
Each employer can only register for one account in our platform, all the reviews that are given will be recorded in our database and used to calibrate for the scoring system that will be done according to the schedule defined in the project. (i.e. in year 2 or 3, depending on the amount of data that can be collected). To illustrate the idea, we would have guided questions like below:
"Please rate how your FDH performed in kitchen cleaning (1 is the worst, 5 is the best, NA is not applicable)"
"Please rate how your FDH performed in dish washing (1 is the worst, 5 is the best, NA is not applicable)"
"Please rate how your FDH performed in assisting elderly to bath (1 is the worst, 5 is the best, NA is not applicable)"
If throughout years the ratings recorded for this employer's account is regularly high or low, his/her scoring will be calibrated accordingly.
Q: Please clarify if the training courses to be listed on the platform are charged courses or free courses.
A:
Both charged and free courses will be listed on the platform. They are useful in different ways.
Free courses mainly come from local agencies and organisations, which provide courses to enrich FDHs' lives in Hong Kong. This helps the FDHs adapt their lives in Hong Kong easier and work in family more productively.
Charged courses are those that can provide internationally recognised certificates, e.g. TESDA, TQUK etc. They can be provided by local or overseas accredited training bodies or universities. Background information including their government license will be recorded in order to make sure that the courses are legitimate and properly recognized.
Q: Please explain how the nature of blockchain could facilitate the development of online standardised and verified profile system. Besides, please explain how the FDHs could be benefited from the system.
A: ...Secondly, being able to register the relationship on the platform once the contract is being signed would reduce the change [chance] of FDHs backing-out during the 1–3 month processing period, since it would leave a record on their profile. This would increase employers' confidence in hiring FDHs directly.
Further explanation of the back-out problem: one of the main problems that employers are currently facing is that the visa processing period for a domestic helper is around 1–3 months, and some FDHs might regret signing the contract during this period. They would back-out from the contract, and there would be monetary loss for the employers, and more importantly, they would need to spend 1–3 more month to wait for another FDH. The chance of FDHs from agencies backing out is much lower, since most agencies would charge the FDHs high fees for recommendation services (usually around 2 month salary). It is illegal, but it is a normal practice in the industry. FDHs at agencies could not back out even if they are being signed to a harsh working environment. They have loans to pay. They would prefer resigning after arriving Hong Kong instead, so that they would have a better chance to look for a new employer. However, as for those that do not go through agencies, they often back-out from one job if they can find a better one. Since FDHs only have 14 days to find an employer after they finish their contract, once they are approaching the day that they need to be deported, they would quickly sign a contract first, even if that is not the best job that they can get. After they submitted the signed contract, their visa will be extended. And during this time period, they can find a better employer and submit another application.
Backing-out is really one of the biggest pain-points that employers are currently facing. This platform could help to register the relationship when the contract is being signed already and increase the confidence level of employers hiring FDHs. It also empowers FDHs so that they would not need to be exploited by agencies' illegally high fees. According to the Hong Kong law, agencies and their partners in respective countries can only charge the FDHs equal or less than 10% of the FDHs' one-month salary. [This explanation is insightful.]
Q: Please elaborate more on the mechanism of the credit scoring system (e.g. the rating criteria, the purpose and expected performance of machine learning) and provide an impact analysis to the stakeholders regarding the credit scoring system.
A: The main principle would be having social network data to supplement ratings and reviews that are already available on the platform. However, the details of the mechanism can only be confirmed after sufficient amount of data collection and research. This is because it would be unfair to all the stakeholders if the scoring is being understated or overstated based on a small dataset. Our initial thought is to give a calibrated scoring for major areas like cooking, cleaning, taking care of elderly, taking care of newborn etc., where are based on feedbacks from employers and their background information, added with some social network data.
For individuals who do not have reliable information and reviews written by their previous employers yet, an estimated rating data can be captured from their peers' reviews according to a set of social network metrics. This evaluation will be done mostly based on the research paper written by Tan and Phan in 2016 for running social network based data analytics. The main idea is that we could use the data from social network site (SNS) because SNS has been exploding in emerging economies, where FDHs normally come from. For example, Filipinos tops in the amount of time spent on social media for four consecutive years. In this year, their average time spent per day is 4 hours and 12 minutes, while the global average this year is at 2 hours and 16 minutes.
As credit score is regarded as one of the reference items, we would like to launch this feature only when it is accurate enough, which can only be done when there are sufficient amount of data in the database for our testing and verification. We estimate that this peripheral feature will be more accurate progressively in the second or third year, and the figures will be much improved in future years.
Q: What if the record is fraudulent in the first place (i.e. before being chained to the block)? Please elaborate on how the proposed platform solve the problem of fraudulent FDH resumes (e.g. fake overseas education qualifications and fake working experience).
Our view is that the problem of fraudulent can be resolved in two different levels. The first level would be technological solutions which can be accomplished based on past data maintained in the BDB system. The second level would be operational solutions, which would be the most important when establishing the first data block of the BDB system.
The records subject to verification can be labelled into different classes or trust levels against the dates. We will be verifying information that are important for employment decisions. Some of this information is indeed verifiable in a straightforward way. For example, education qualifications, and working experiences etc. For non-verifiable information or information that are not under verification, the data will be Labelled "Not Verified" or "Subject to Verification".
For education qualifications, certificates will be checked and recorded. As the project is based in HKUST, we will also be approaching education institutions and training schools directly in some formal and effective channels. For example, login panels will be provided for partnered ones, on which their graduate affair department can help to verify the graduation record and issue smart contract qualification directly. Reference letters from school members can also be stored in the system.
In order to avoid corruptions or issues happening because of negligence, regular sampling inspection will be done. We will be picking out resumes randomly and check their certifications carefully even if they are being verified directly by education institutions and training schools.
Estonian-founded Guardtime to build wine authentication system in Australia
Guardtime's general manager for supply chain, David Shorthouse says the company was intrigued when Clare Valley winemaker Jeff Grosset and grapegrower David Travers contacted Guardtime asking to build a solution that would provide proof of provenance, authenticity and integrity of wine using a 'digital' screw cap.
According to the wine experts Grosset and Travers, the global wine market is under threat due to increasing wine fraud. As Forbes has reported, counterfeit wines are a multi-billion dollar issue in the world's wine industry.
Guardtime's expertise lies in building enterprise products, such as its platform for supply chains. A key building block is its patented portfolio of cryptographic technology that is proven to work at scale. Its core functionality is the ability to validate information—whether a configuration file in a network router or a health record in a hospital database, without the need to trust those who are managing that information. At a higher level Guardtime provides integrity of business data and business process.
Blockchain set to enable better land management systems
Blockchain has the potential to open up opportunities for countries that don't have a reliable land registration and transfer system.
It [blockchain] could particularly be of use in situations where there has been a natural disaster, war, or corruption at a regional or national level.
Estonia is running its country like a tech company
Estonia is often described as a genuinely digital society.
Today a majority of government services are offered 24/7 online, and data integrity is ensured by blockchain technology. You can use medical e-prescriptions, file taxes, or even buy a car online without needing to go to the vehicle registration office. There are only a few things that you still need to do in the analog world, such as get married or buy property.
If you can easily buy books online, make bank transactions, and log in to your social media account within seconds, then why can't a public service work equally well? If people can manage their finances online, why not your social-services account? If you can receive prompts from your mobile operator to see when a package will arrive, shouldn't you be able to receive text prompts from your government to renew your driver's license?
At no point during the digital transformation of Estonian society did we create cutting-edge technology from scratch. Tech-wise, everything we use is rather mundane and commonly used by other actors, mostly private. This is good, because it makes it affordable and reliable.
New technologies are useless without the supporting legal framework to ensure their responsible use.
The digital format provides much more control over personal data than the paper format, provided that the legal space prescribes clear rules on data gathering, storage, and use. The Estonian people know that meddling in public databases cannot go unnoticed because it would be recorded and secured by blockchain-based timestamping, and officials know that it is a criminal offense to nose around.
But what is even more important is that your personal data does not belong to the Estonian state. Just because it's in the database doesn't mean that Estonia owns it—it belongs to you. At any second you have the right to know and control what happens to this data.
In 2007, Estonia fell prey to a series of cyber attacks, originating largely from Russian IP addresses.
There are also amazing things happening in Africa, which has a great potential to leapfrog into the digital era much more quickly than established countries with legacy systems.
Ten years ago, our country gained the unenviable title of being the first in the world to experience a nationwide cyber attack. Although no data was compromised, the attackers sent large amounts of web traffic to overwhelm systems in an attempt to take them offline.
One of the innovations that was integrated into several of these services is a distributed ledger that can never be erased or rewritten. This kind of ledger technology is now more commonly known as a blockchain and is more famous for its role in enabling cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum to operate without a central authority.
Through close co-operation between the public and private sector, Estonia has emerged as a leading startup hub. One of the world's largest blockchain companies, Guardtime, started here as well as a number of other startups that are using blockchain in increasingly creative ways to disrupt traditional industries.
Clearer policy frameworks around blockchain are now on the way globally too, including regulations that will require stronger KYC (know your customer) procedures to reduce risk and protect the public interest from challenges like money laundering. Unfortunately, this could also increase costs for blockchain startups or limit their products and services to certain markets.
Even without the legal requirement for stronger KYC, blockchain pioneers face high costs to verify who they are dealing with online and also high risks if they get it wrong.
A secure government-backed digital identity would help simplify the KYC process for startups.
Fortunately, those secure government-issued digital identities are now available globally through e-Residency.
Response 1:
My partner, who is Estonian and I thought about returning to Estonia, but after investigating the laws around Estonian taxes and Bitcoin, it seems like a terrible place for us. 25% income tax on capital gains + around 30% social taxes? Where's the incentive?
Response 2: Blockchain can mean almost anything these days. What exactly is the technology behind this "ledger that can never be erased or rewritten"? Is it like the BTC/ETH public blockchains? Or is it a database protected with digital signatures? Is it truly distributed across multiple nodes voting on consensus (consensus of what by the way) or it is a regular distributed file system? Around the world, entrepreneurs use the term "blockchain" without precision, shamelessly attracting attention and capital.
Regular security applications need to take care. "Immutability" never was a requirement until Bitcoin came along. Government registries need to be adequately tamper resistant of course, but true immutability is irrelevant in regular file management where mistakes are routine and editing is normal.
Estonian e-Residency provides digital entrepreneurs the freedom to establish and manage an EU-based company paperlessly, from anywhere in the world.
Note, an e-Residency digital ID card provides access to e-services, but it is not a valid form of physical identification and cannot be used as a travel document. e-Residency does not confer citizenship, tax residency, physical residency or right of entry to Estonia or the European Union.
20200127~20200206 Revising section 1.1 to 1.3
Useful links
Hiring local domestic helpers
FAQ for Employers (Smart Living)
If a Smart Helper is hired under a verbal contract, is the employer bound by the verbal agreement?
A contract of employment is an agreement between the employer and the Smart Helper that sets out the terms and conditions of employment. The agreement can be made verbally or in writing. Both parties are bound by the terms of the agreement, provided that it does not violate any provisions of the Employment Ordinance (Cap. 57).
Source: https://www.erb.org/smartliving/en/employers-FAQ/
Hiring foreign domestic helpers
Conditions of employment for foreign domestic helpers - A general guide to the employer (ID(E)954)
Can I employ an FDH who is now in Hong Kong and whose contract has been terminated before it has run its course?
Where a contract is broken before it has run its course, the FDH will not be allowed to change employment in Hong Kong save in exceptional circumstances (e.g. when the previous employer is unable to continue with the contract because of external transfer, emigration, death or financial reasons; or there is evidence that the FDH has been abused or exploited). If he/she wishes to take up another job here, he/she must return to his/her place of origin and apply for the appropriate visa directly to the Director of Immigration either by post or through you.
Can I employ an FDH who is now in Hong Kong and whose contract has been completed in full?
Yes, provided that he/she submits the application to the Immigration Department within four weeks prior to the expiry of his/her existing contract. He/She will normally be required to take a home leave before returning to Hong Kong to start a new contract. If circumstances do not permit the FDH to take home leave immediately upon expiry of the old contract, subject to your mutual agreement with the FDH, he/she may apply for an extension of stay to defer the home leave.
Who is responsible for assessing whether a person is eligible to employ an FDH?
The Director of Immigration will assess the eligibility of the applicants as per the criteria given in the Guidebook. Those who are considered ineligible may request reconsideration through the channel provided in the written notification.
Source: https://www.immd.gov.hk/pdforms/ID(E)954.pdf
Standard Employment Contract and Terms of Employment for Helpers
Source: https://www.immd.gov.hk/eng/forms/forms/fdhcontractterms.html
Other details
Domestic Helper Blockchain Database Research Proposal (Amanda)
Currently, employers would write their reviews in forums and Facebook pages. However, there are three major issues with this method:
Our proposed system offers the following benefits:
Q: Please specify at which point(s) the employer reviews on the FDHs will be conducted. Besides, please explain how the proposed project ensures the objectivity of the employer reviews apart from using guided questions.
A: Once an employer and a FDH register their accounts and establish a relationship on the platform, employers can write a concise review for their FDHs in a fixed period of time, say every three month or half a year, until the contract expires or the working relationship ends. The employer can write a more comprehensive review when the contract ends. [I thought about this method as well.]
The objectivity of reviews will be ensured or strengthened by the following two ways:
Q: Please clarify if the training courses to be listed on the platform are charged courses or free courses.
A:
Q: Please explain how the nature of blockchain could facilitate the development of online standardised and verified profile system. Besides, please explain how the FDHs could be benefited from the system.
A: ...Secondly, being able to register the relationship on the platform once the contract is being signed would reduce the change [chance] of FDHs backing-out during the 1–3 month processing period, since it would leave a record on their profile. This would increase employers' confidence in hiring FDHs directly.
Further explanation of the back-out problem: one of the main problems that employers are currently facing is that the visa processing period for a domestic helper is around 1–3 months, and some FDHs might regret signing the contract during this period. They would back-out from the contract, and there would be monetary loss for the employers, and more importantly, they would need to spend 1–3 more month to wait for another FDH. The chance of FDHs from agencies backing out is much lower, since most agencies would charge the FDHs high fees for recommendation services (usually around 2 month salary). It is illegal, but it is a normal practice in the industry. FDHs at agencies could not back out even if they are being signed to a harsh working environment. They have loans to pay. They would prefer resigning after arriving Hong Kong instead, so that they would have a better chance to look for a new employer. However, as for those that do not go through agencies, they often back-out from one job if they can find a better one. Since FDHs only have 14 days to find an employer after they finish their contract, once they are approaching the day that they need to be deported, they would quickly sign a contract first, even if that is not the best job that they can get. After they submitted the signed contract, their visa will be extended. And during this time period, they can find a better employer and submit another application.
Backing-out is really one of the biggest pain-points that employers are currently facing. This platform could help to register the relationship when the contract is being signed already and increase the confidence level of employers hiring FDHs. It also empowers FDHs so that they would not need to be exploited by agencies' illegally high fees. According to the Hong Kong law, agencies and their partners in respective countries can only charge the FDHs equal or less than 10% of the FDHs' one-month salary. [This explanation is insightful.]
Q: Please elaborate more on the mechanism of the credit scoring system (e.g. the rating criteria, the purpose and expected performance of machine learning) and provide an impact analysis to the stakeholders regarding the credit scoring system.
A: The main principle would be having social network data to supplement ratings and reviews that are already available on the platform. However, the details of the mechanism can only be confirmed after sufficient amount of data collection and research. This is because it would be unfair to all the stakeholders if the scoring is being understated or overstated based on a small dataset. Our initial thought is to give a calibrated scoring for major areas like cooking, cleaning, taking care of elderly, taking care of newborn etc., where are based on feedbacks from employers and their background information, added with some social network data.
For individuals who do not have reliable information and reviews written by their previous employers yet, an estimated rating data can be captured from their peers' reviews according to a set of social network metrics. This evaluation will be done mostly based on the research paper written by Tan and Phan in 2016 for running social network based data analytics. The main idea is that we could use the data from social network site (SNS) because SNS has been exploding in emerging economies, where FDHs normally come from. For example, Filipinos tops in the amount of time spent on social media for four consecutive years. In this year, their average time spent per day is 4 hours and 12 minutes, while the global average this year is at 2 hours and 16 minutes.
As credit score is regarded as one of the reference items, we would like to launch this feature only when it is accurate enough, which can only be done when there are sufficient amount of data in the database for our testing and verification. We estimate that this peripheral feature will be more accurate progressively in the second or third year, and the figures will be much improved in future years.
Q: What if the record is fraudulent in the first place (i.e. before being chained to the block)? Please elaborate on how the proposed platform solve the problem of fraudulent FDH resumes (e.g. fake overseas education qualifications and fake working experience).
Our view is that the problem of fraudulent can be resolved in two different levels. The first level would be technological solutions which can be accomplished based on past data maintained in the BDB system. The second level would be operational solutions, which would be the most important when establishing the first data block of the BDB system.
The records subject to verification can be labelled into different classes or trust levels against the dates. We will be verifying information that are important for employment decisions. Some of this information is indeed verifiable in a straightforward way. For example, education qualifications, and working experiences etc. For non-verifiable information or information that are not under verification, the data will be Labelled "Not Verified" or "Subject to Verification".
For education qualifications, certificates will be checked and recorded. As the project is based in HKUST, we will also be approaching education institutions and training schools directly in some formal and effective channels. For example, login panels will be provided for partnered ones, on which their graduate affair department can help to verify the graduation record and issue smart contract qualification directly. Reference letters from school members can also be stored in the system.
In order to avoid corruptions or issues happening because of negligence, regular sampling inspection will be done. We will be picking out resumes randomly and check their certifications carefully even if they are being verified directly by education institutions and training schools.
Estonian-founded Guardtime to build wine authentication system in Australia
Source: https://e-estonia.com/guardtime-wine-authentication-system/
Blockchain set to enable better land management systems
Source: https://www.rmit.edu.au/news/all-news/2019/march/blockchain-for-better-land-management-systems
Estonia is running its country like a tech company
Source: https://qz.com/1535549/living-on-the-blockchain-is-a-game-changer-for-estonian-citizens/
Welcome to the blockchain nation
Response 1:
Response 2: Blockchain can mean almost anything these days. What exactly is the technology behind this "ledger that can never be erased or rewritten"? Is it like the BTC/ETH public blockchains? Or is it a database protected with digital signatures? Is it truly distributed across multiple nodes voting on consensus (consensus of what by the way) or it is a regular distributed file system? Around the world, entrepreneurs use the term "blockchain" without precision, shamelessly attracting attention and capital.
Regular security applications need to take care. "Immutability" never was a requirement until Bitcoin came along. Government registries need to be adequately tamper resistant of course, but true immutability is irrelevant in regular file management where mistakes are routine and editing is normal.
Source: https://medium.com/e-residency-blog/welcome-to-the-blockchain-nation-5d9b46c06fd4
What is e-Residency
Source: https://learn.e-resident.gov.ee/hc/en-us/articles/360000711978-What-is-e-Residency