Maid in Brazil: Drama

When my husband told me we were moving to Brazil, one of his selling points was that I could have a full time maid for very little money. Of course, anyone would think that is awesome. Someone to cook and clean for you! A dream come true. Until the dreamworld gets a reality check. I was lucky when I arrived that someone knew of a maid that needed a job so I was able to get one right away. She was awesome. She liked my kids, my dog, worked really hard and it was all good. A few months after we were happily going along, she started asking about a 13th payment. I had heard something about this. As far as I knew, the 13th payment meant that after 1 year, you pay them for an extra month. I told her she had only worked a few months so she would get a 13th payment after she worked there a year. She stopped showing up and started calling everyone I knew relentlessly. Apparently when people helped me with Portuguese she had saved everyone's phone number. She started harassing me and all my friends saying I owed her more money. She threatened to take me to the justice court. She said she was going to call the TV station and tell them her story. It was a 2 month nightmare and this was all around Xmas time when my parents had come to visit for the first time. In the end, I ended up paying an accountant to calculate how much I owed her because I couldn't take the harassment anymore. The accountant told her that I had actually over-paid her and that I owe her nothing. She even went into the accountant's office with her son to dispute this information and was told the calculation was correct. Thankfully, the phone calls finally stopped. What I didn't know at the time is that the 13th payment is supposed to be paid in 2 installments, one in November and one in December, regardless of how long they worked for you! If your maid worked for you from May to November and you pay her R$700 per month. You divide that amount by 12 ($58,33) and multiply it by the 7 months she has worked for you (R$408,33) and you pay her 1/2 of that in November and 1/2 of it at the beginning of December. My second maid was suggested by someone else's maid. She was the worst maid ever. She ruined clothes and stole them, she never got anything really clean. Every time I had a Portuguese lesson she would waste the whole class babbling at my teacher so I learned nothing. One time she took my $1200 wool turkish rug with natural dye that I actually got in Istanbul, saturated it with water and then left it folded up outside soaking wet. I have no idea why anyone would do that but it took days to dry, all the ink ran together and she basically ruined it. She constantly had excuses and I did feel sorry for her. She didn't know how to read. She has 3 small kids, her husband died and her mother had breast cancer. I only kept her a couple of months and then she stopped showing up because she was taking care of her mom and her son was having behavior problems at school and she got in trouble for leaving her kids home by themselves while she came to work out my house. For this maid I ended up keeping the accountant to do the calculations every month, calculate the taxes, etc. because of all the trouble I had with the previous maid. She ended up quitting to take care of her mom but this brings me to my next point. If the maid quits, you owe her less money than if you fire her! Even if she steals and ruins everything, you have to pay her another month. It is totally messed up, but this is the law in Brazil. Maid #3 was with me for a year and a half. She was very quiet, did her work and never said good-bye when she left. For this maid, I decided I would do my own calculations and payments. I would give her transportation every week and her monthly salary every month. At the end of the first year, you have to pay the vacation pay. I had an agreement with my maid to just pay her vacation when we traveled so I didn't owe any extra for that. Since we are foreigners, we spent several weeks a year traveling and I would pay her like we were there and she was working. The next point is, get everything in writing! If you want to pay her while you travel, have her sign something saying she is OK with it. Also, I have my maid sign a document every month with the amount I paid for her salary and for transportation so she can never come back and claim that I didn't pay her something. This maid, unfortunately, was stealing stuff from me the whole time and it all came to a conclusion when I caught her red-handed with witnesses stealing 2 garbage bags of stuff from me. This was after I confronted her about things that we missing and she acted all innocent. After this, I blocked her from coming into the condominio. I wanted to call the cops and file a police report. I wanted to tell her she was not getting a dime from me and she actually owed me $ for all the stuff she took. I wanted to scream at her about what a liar and thief she is. But I didn't. Why? I talked to a lawyer about the situation and his is advice was DO NOT make these people mad. They have been in your house. They know what kind of stuff you have. They know that you travel at certain times of the year. They know where your kids go to school. And, they probably know some real criminals. A scary thought and one I hadn't thought of. When the maid starts working for you more than 2 days a week, you must sign her workbook saying she works for you. When she no longer works for you, you sign it to say she is not employed with you anymore. I told her to leave her workbook at the portaria and I would sign it saying she no longer works for me and she could return the next day to pick up her payment, her workbook and the items she left at my house. I told the lady that runs the comdominio that she is not allowed to receive the payment until she signs the document saying she received it. Now I have my 4th maid in 3 years. She only works 3 days a week and refuses to cook. In conclusion, I will summarize in a shorter version of the information above. Hiring a maid: Have her sign a document saying she is on a 90 day trial period and you can part ways for any reason during that time. If you decide to keep her after 90 days, have her sign a document saying she works for you and she will be paid X amount for salary, X amount for transportation, X amount for vacation (mine always said she gets to take vacation when I take mine and that is the payment she will receive) and the 13th payment. Sign her workbook saying she works for you. I take a scan of all her identification cards so I have all of her information, just in case. After all, she knows everything about you, right?! One last piece of advice, I knew for the longest time that my maid was stealing and I didn't fire her because it is a pain to find a new one. I went against my instincts and now I will never see the more than 25 items that she took, most of them from my daughter. She even stole from my friends. FOLLOW YOUR INSTINCTS! If you suspect anything or feel uncomfortable in any way, please do not hesitate to get rid of her. Take it from me.