It has been reported in a recent Guardian article that Philippine job agencies have cheated women out of money and pushed them into crippling debt. The individuals who have fallen victim to these actions are women applying for work overseas, commonly domestic workers. The agencies charged these women large illegal fees, such as medical fees and training fees, which they could not afford. This comes as no surprise as 18% of the Philippines population lives below the poverty line. Since their economic situation is poor in their country, they tend to apply for jobs overseas in order to improve their economic status, and unfortunately, they become vulnerable to job agencies who exploit them. Throughout the article several women attest to the amount of pressure placed by the agencies to take out loans from their preferred loan companies and a shared feeling among the victims is that they felt like they had no choice. Annabelle Gutierrez applied for a job in Hong Kong through A&W International Manpower Service and was informed she would need to take out a loan to cover medical and training fees. The agency did not give her a choice about where to get the loan, instead arranging for Prosperity & Success Lending Investor Corporation to be the only option for her. Her documents were held onto until the day of her flight, so she couldn’t pursue a loan with a company of her choice. The loan she was forced to take out had an annual interest rate of 136%. To make matters worse, her contract was ended by her employer after only 2 weeks. She is now struggling to pay back the loan and both the recruitment and loan companies send her threatening messages on social media. Annabelle’s story is only one of many that reflect the abuse and exploitation done by employment agencies and lender companies. In 2020 and 2021, Migrasia (a migrants’ rights organization) filed complaints about the women’s treatment with ten Philippine government departments, including the Security and Exchange Commission and the Presidential Anti-Corruption Commission. A total of 12 licensed loan firms operating in the Philippines were named in the complaints.
How can migrant workers avoid being scammed by job agencies? Not only do they have to worry about being assigned a good employer but it seems that they must also pray they get a good job agency.