Helper rarely comes home on time

My helper rarely comes home at the time (10pm) we agreed, what upsets me most is that she always gives evasive answers when I ask why. I have told her many times that she should at least text me and let me know. A frequently-used excuse is her phone battery is dead so I gave my old moible to her. Last night, she kept me waiting till 2am - again, without clear reason. I have told her that I'd rather hear a truth story that might not be pleasant but it's true. She works OK, had broke things and don't always clean things properly but she makes effort to make the room tidy. But I really hate to deal with her coming home late every Sat/Sun night, being 30' late I can live with but 1hr+ and without good reason is too much. Am I being too fussy?

10pm is what we both agreed. Exactly, I feel like having a teenage girl at home. I needed to wait since I have a young baby.

Yes you are being too fussy. She is an adult, not a child. She is an employee, not a family member. Let her come home whenever she wants. Give her a key and expect mature behavior.


As long as she starts working at the agreed time in the morning and is in a fit state to work, that is all that matters.

Liam, I am assuming that you are talking about her return from her weekly day off.


What time does your helper get off duty? If it's ten pm the night before, then it's perfectly within your rights to require her to be back at ten. I am making some assumptions here- that either you want her to help put the baby to sleep or you need her help early in the morning and she can't do this if she's been out till the wee hours of the morning.


@axptguy: you are IMO one of the most sensible posters on this forum but I have to disagree with you here. You are right in that the helper is an employee, and it is responsible to expect the employee to turn up to her place of work on time. Liam's home is not only the helper's residence, it's her place of employment. If they both agreed to a start time, then it should be fulfilled unless it is explicitly renegotiated.


@cara: ditto that I usually find your posts to be very sensible. In this case, the helper that Liam has described is not acting like an adult and as such should not be treated as someone who is responsible. She is breaking a mutual agreement and is offering excuses that one might be prepared to accept as a temporary phase from an adolescent, but not from an employee.


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I find myself in a comparable situation, but without the trouble. My helper gets off duty at 10pm Saturday and is explicitly required to be back by 10pm on Sunday (even though she gets back several hours earlier by preference). Why do I have an apparently arbitrary rule? Because I want to make sure that she gets enough sleep to be able to safely help my wife with 5am baby feedings, and I also wanted to make it clear to her when she goes 'off duty' she does't have to work with the baby and takes her time off at night.


My advice, and this is predicated on the assumption that the helper is getting a proper 24 hour break per week, is to have a serious discussion about what your agreement is, how she is not meeting this agreement, make it crystal clear what her future expected performance is and what the consequences of failing to meet these requirements are.


Keep it factual. Something like "We agreed that you would be home by 10pm, and that you would call if you would be late. You have been home at 2am, 11am and 1am for the last three weeks. You have not called. For the next four weeks, you will either be back by 10pm, or if you know you will be late, you will let me know by 9pm regardless of where you are or whether your phone is working. If you do not meet these requirements, then I will have to reconsider whether you should be working for me".


If this works, then great. If it doesn't then be prepared to find a replacement.

Hmm... I do already help my wife once a week, first thing on Sunday morning. Sometimes on Saturdays. Generally, I think my wife needs all the help she can get- she's bottle feeding and pumping at different times, and trying to transition from the former to the latter. This means that she tends to get naps that last about 2-3 hours at the most, plus deal with the emotional downside of not being able to breast feed.


Also, being explicitly off by 10pm Saturday is valuable because it reminds us not to call on our helper after this time for anything- I want to make sure that her rights are protected, and that we don't slide into the practice of taking advantage of her. The last employer she had abused this greatly.


Our arrangement might strike you as a bit OTT, and is not even operationally necessary- our helper always gets in by eight. But I think that there is value in having clarity around working hours.


Our helper is a decent person, but she needs a great deal of patient, repeated instruction, verification and guidelines. The reason that I want the helper to stick to a schedule is that I want her to get up to speed- so far she is just taking too long to perform some basic tasks at the speed at which we expect them to be done.


As far as I can tell, she's never had to think creatively or proactively before, so I am trying to train her. Until she develops initiative and becomes more confident in working with us, having black and white guidelines are useful.

I too expect my helper to come home at 10.30pm every Sunday night. She doesn't go at 10.30pm on Saturday night but rather, she goes early in the morning at 7am.


I don't expect her to help me with the chores when she comes home on Sunday night. When she gets home, my children are already asleep and I've washed all dishes already. We are talking 10.30pm here.


The only reason why I say 10.30pm is so that she gets enough rest. She has to wake up at 6.30am the next day. When she comes home, she takes a shower, has her supper (usually bread and tea) and sorts her stuff (takes in the washing - her choice) and by then it is already close to midnight. I'd hate to think how much sleep she'd get if she rocks in at 2am.


I understand that we shouldn't need to wait up for an adult. But the thing is, it is just common courtesy to call. If she calls and tells me she'll be late, I'm fine with it. But if she doesn't, I think I'd be worried about what's happened to her.


My helper has never been home that late before though.

There are two issues here as I see it:

- The "right" of the employer to set a curfew. There is no such right spelled out in the law. Besides, a curfew is pointless and insulting. If your employee is a responsible person, she will be able to handle work without needing a curfew.

- The agreement between helper and employee as to the time she should be home. The helper doesn't seem to be able to come home in the time she agreed. Whatever one thinks of curfew, if the helper promised to be home by this time and consistently isn't, that is an issue.


My advice is to remove the curfew, but also to have a serious talk with the helper. Treating her like an adult also means expecting her to behave as such. For example a responsible adult should know how much rest she needs. If she is consistently tired when she starts work and cannot perform, that is definitely a problem. But the issue is not curfew or not, it is an employee who cannot behave responsibly enough to give herself enough rest.


Bottom line in my opinion: She is an employee. If she wants to stay out at night and have a glass of wine or three, that is her prerogative. As long as it doesn't affect her work it doesn't matter.



GemmaW said:

"I understand that we shouldn't need to wait up for an adult. But the thing is, it is just common courtesy to call. If she calls and tells me she'll be late, I'm fine with it. But if she doesn't, I think I'd be worried about what's happened to her."


I think this is a bit borderline. I mean I don't worry if my wife is out late. Why should I worry about our helper. An adult should be expected to be able to be out at night without incident. Then again it is nice that you worry about her and a simple call or text is of course no bigs on her part.

Thank you for your responses. I just bought the book Hiring and Managing Domestic Help and found it very helpful.

How old is the helper? Is she attractive? She may have a boyfriend or worse yet be hanging out in Wanchai. Both would explain her behavior although of course there could be other explanations. Your only concern of course should be that if she gets pregnant she is your responsibility.

Surely it's more a security issue than anything. I don't think you have the right to 'control' her on her days off but you do have the right to secure your home at night as you see fit. I would feel very uncomfortable leaving the door unbolted after I go to bed. OP, just tell her that at xyz time you will be going to bed and if she can't make it home by then, she will have to find alternative accommodation for the night.

Auslass, at first I thought that was a strange response but then I started thinking about people who live in village houses, out in the boondocks. They might cause an issue on both sides as the traveling time from town might be extensive using public transport, and yet security might be a real issue. Perhaps in this scenario the helper could stay in town on Sunday nights and come back early in the morning to start work?

Well, not just in semi-rural areas but also in urban areas. If a helper is regularly coming home at 2am, obviously you are not going to stay up until then to bolt the door. Both apartments we have lived in (one serviced, one rented) have bolts on the door. They are likely to be there for a good reason and would feel uncomfortable not using them.

The relpies to the OP are more about whether or not she has the freedom to come home at 10 or later. What about the fact that she regularly has excuses and evades the explicit request that she agreed to do in the first place?

If one agrees to something and then does not follow through, I think this is is a breech of trust.

How about starting a conversation with, "We both agreed on this, but you can't seem to do it, what is causing your problem?" Then take the conversation from there. Explain that you have a rather unusual workng relationship in that you both live and work together. Does she have other problems preventing her from obeying an agreed on time to return home?

Her excuse for being late is always weak, such as: had to wait for a friend; or a friend wanted her to stay a bit longer. And the reason that she came home at 2am was she was too drunk and she lost her bank card so she had to look for it. Yes, she does go to bars in Wanchai and she told us about it. I think that's her private life and she has the right to do whatever she likes in her day off. I'm not too worried about her being pregnant she's married with 4 kids!

If my DH was out drunk after 2am and had to start work early the next morning..she'd no longer be in my employ! Yes, people have a right to their own entertainment etc but she is here under your guidance and frankly partying until the wee hours of the morning, drunk, is not something i'd be vouching for with immigration. Not to mention how i'd want a still drunk woman looking after my newborn. (if she's drunk enough to lose her credit card, it's not gonna wear off by 7am my dear!)I'll take my FDHs without the party attitude. The same goes for my business..as an owner, if i found out my staff were out till after hours drunk and coming to work within hours of being drunk, they'd be fired.

Yes, she does go to bars in Wanchai and she told us about it. I think that's her private life and she has the right to do whatever she likes in her day off. I'm not too worried about her being pregnant she's married with 4 kids! quote LiamHk.


The fact she is married with 4 kids, doesn't stop her 'messing around' with the odd sailor or other guy, especially if she has had a few drinks.there have been a few married FDH's over time getting pregnant in HK.

~ exactly~ Liam worries about the helper coming home late, but not because she is drunk after being in Wanchai after 2am? weird.

Of course it bothers me, missprince. During weekdays she works hard enough and is nice to my child, but she seems lose self-control on her day off. She's currently under "negative watch".

Hmmm..really, cos earlier you said what she did on her on time was acceptable and none of your business. The woman has 4 kids to a man in a developing country and is spending $ out on the town getting drunk. You have big issues.

Mmmm, as a professional nanny I can see it both ways.


1. she works the hours as stated by her contract. If work hours don't start till 7am in the morning, then as employers you have no right to ask her to be back at 10pm the night before. She is an adult and is quite capable of looking after herself.


2. As parents I can also understand you might not like the idea of your home been treated like a hotel, coming and going at all hours of the night. I know some mothers can't get sleep, as they are worried about their employees, worried if they have been mugged or injured.


So you need to set boundaries. One, they be home at 10pm, for security reasons, and for the safetly and well being of your family. Not because you wish to 'control' you DH. Or they be ready

To start work at the beginning of the shift say 7am. Then let the DH decide which option she would like to do.