MALAYSIANS can start sourcing foreign domestic helpers (FDH) directly from the nine source countries so that they can register them with the Immigration Department come January.
Immigration director-general Datuk Seri Mustafar Ali said the department would be ready to help Malaysians register online at the start of the year.
Employers, he said, would need time to source foreign maids and get them checked.
Mustafar told the New Straits Times that there would be a new component to the Immigration system which managed foreign labour.
The department will introduce the Foreign Workers Biometric Health Screening System to screen the medical reports of potential maids.
This, he said, was to prevent falsification of medical reports, especially by workers who had failed theirs, but were determined to work here.
He said the online registration would speed up the process.
“The online registration will be efficient in handling this stage of the recruitment process,” he told the NST yesterday.
He said employers planning to source foreign maids themselves would be responsible for sending these helpers for training.
Under Immigration rules, a foreign domestic helper must be a female aged between 21 and 45.
Upon arrival here, they are required to undergo a medical check-up at any clinic that is in the panel of the Foreign Workers Medical Examination Monitoring Agency. The candidate should also have undergone a check-up at her home country.
Mustafar said Malaysians had the choice of sourcing foreign maids directly or through agents.
“It is up to them. Hiring maids without going through agents will be cheaper.
“It is the government’s decision made in the best interest of the people. This policy proves that the government is concerned about the people’s needs.”
During the tabling of the 2018 Budget on Friday, Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak announced that employers could opt to hire maids directly from Indonesia, the Philippines, Cambodia, India, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, Thailand, Nepal and Laos.