Posted by
GemmaW
16 yrs ago
Hi, I have a big problem with my helper despite repeated discussions with her.
Our telephone keeps ringing in the middle of the night. It wakes me up and I cannot sleep after it.
She keeps denying that it's for her but I've told her that these calls only started after we employed her. Then last night, the phone rang again at midnight and I saw her taking the phone into the room. I confronted her and she said, "Oh mam, I don't know who it was". I replied, "Then why did you take it to your room if you didn't know who it was?" and she said, "Oh I'm just a bit blur". I have had thousands of repeated conversations with her regarding this matter but it falls on deaf ears.
I really don't know what to do.
I don't mind that she uses the phone (I've told her that), but I do MIND that the phone rings in the middle of the night waking my family up.
A separate landline just for her is also out of the question as our apartment isn't that big and it's an extra expense for us.
I've told her already that the phone can ring between 7am - 11pm (within reason - that she doesn't spend hours and hours on the phone) but it must not ring afterwards so that we can all sleep peacefully.
I think I've spoken to her more than 6 times already.
Any ideas what I can do?
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I would give her a formal warning in writing and have her sign it. If she does not respect the rules in your house and tell her friends/family to not phone after a certain time, then you will have no alternative but to terminate the contract.
Tell her you no longer wish for her to give out your phone number and she is has lost the privalege of using the house phone and from now on personal calls must be taken on her mobile phone during personal down time and breaks. if she does not adhere to these new rules, then she must leave.
It is your home and she is abusing your generosity. The only other alterntive is to change the number and that is a pain for you and why should you do it!!
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First of all, unplug the phone when you go to bed and plug it back in in the morning. That way you both get the sleep you need and she can't get the calls she thinks she needs.
Secondly, tell her that you think she is not being truthful. If you cannot trust her in this, how can she expect you to trust her in other things. Warn her that if this continues, you will have no choice but to let her go. If you see no improvement, terminate her.
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Do you have Caller ID ? You can always call back to that number and tell them stop calling. When it's unknown or blocked, then you can ask PCCW to add the service that you do not accept these kind of calls.
They also have a service now that can prevent this problem. At night you can use this service.... you enter function number *XX# I can't remember what the number is, but once you turn that function on, all calls coming into your line needs to have a security number input before it gets through.
We did that for awhile because I suspected it was also calling for my DH.... it was worse, it was at 4:00am.... after I used it , it stopped.
So you can give your passcode to your family in case of emergency... so they would get through the line, but no other.
Your helper also needs formal warning....
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I have not allowed personal calls on our housephone at all. In fact, the issue has never come up.
I did, however say to our helper when she started that she may give our number to family member in Philippines and emergency contact here in HK only.
Any personal calls she wishes to make are done on her mobile in her room.
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JinHK
16 yrs ago
Your Helper may be telling the truth.
Our phone started ringing between midnight and three a.m. a few month back. Almost every time it is a fax machine calling our phone and on other times it is Chinese speaking salespeople.
When we first arrived in HK some years back we were forced to take the line out of the socket at night and ask our family and friends back home to ring our mobile if there was an emergency.
As soon as the facility to block fax and unwanted calls was introduced we registered for it and our nights were bliss but lately nuisance calls are managing to get through. Not every night but enough to be a nuisance.
If you want to be sure why don't you ask your Helper not to answer the phone at night and answer it yourself. If it is for your Helper then you can ask the caller not to call at that time of night.
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with axptguy on that one - unplug the phone.
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Unplug the phone when you go to sleep!
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Thank you. I went with unplugging the phone.
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Maybe your helper borrowed money from the bank and now she's not paying. So for the helper to pay they will call in the midle of the night to threatened her.
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Yes, I've heard about that! Friend of our helper borrowed money and was 4 days delayed for paying. Collectors started phoning the Employer's number in the middle of the night just to threaten the helper to get terminated by the employer.
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Has anyone on this forum not figured out (yet) why Domestic Helpers keep changing their cell phone numbers? It has to do with making it difficult for debt collectors to locate them. Debt collectors could be other Filippinas etc etc. My previous D.H.
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