DOHA: Foreigners, before boarding a plane to Qatar to take up private sector jobs, would soon be able to check the credentials of companies that have offered them employment, on the website of the Ministry of Labor.
The Ministry recently conducted a survey of some 65,000 companies and based on their track record classified them into three groups: A, B and C.
C-grade companies are to be avoided since they include those accused of selling work visas, have no jobs to offer and generally leave their employees in the lurch, to fend for themselves.
For all practical purposes, companies under this classification are bad paymasters, abuse workers’ rights and are blacklisted for their flagrant violation of provisions of the labour law, according to senior labour ministry officials.
Companies making it to the A category are the best ones in terms of treating their workers, paying them on time and respecting their rights and privileges as enshrined in the labour law.
B category companies, that are in a majority, on the other hand, are those which have been accused of violating some provisions of the labour law but those violations are minor and there is hope that they would repair their record and climb up the classification ladder.
“We will be updating the classification every six months based on our field surveys and close interaction with the companies,” said Mohamed Al Mir, assistant director of Labor Inspection Department. He was addressing a news conference on the issue yesterday along with Fawaz Al Rais, director of Recruitment Department at the Ministry of Labor. Al Rais said they would soon be uploading the companies’ classification on the ministry’s website.
The officials said they have urged the Interior Ministry and other government agencies to extend their full support to A-grade companies for complying with the labour law.
“This is an incentive we are offering these companies. This would create healthy competition in the private sector and more and more companies would like to emulate the A-grade ones and climb up to the elite list,” said Al Mir. The classification does not, in any way, mean that the Labor Ministry has any intention to punish B or C-grade companies, the officials said. They, however, refused to give the number of companies in each category.
The Peninsula
