POEA warns OFWs against holding two visas

MANILA, Philippines – The Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) warned prospective overseas Filipino workers against the double-visa scheme of some recruiters, saying this will cause them problems at the airport and at their destination.

POEA chief Hans Leo Cacdac issued the warning in a press statement as he ordered the preventive suspension of Hiro Global Manpower Inc., CAZ International Inc. and Al-Walih International Manpower Services Company after they were found using the double-visa scheme in the deployment of their workers.

These recruitment agencies were guilty of misrepresentation when they submitted for processing the POEA documents of their household service worker applicants under different job titles, he said.

This prompted the POEA to initiate separate complaints against the recruitment agencies, Cacdac added.

Recruitment agencies using the modus of acquiring a second visa for another job title is usually for deploying household workers bound for the Middle East.

According to Cacdac, greedy recruiters favor the double visa deployment scheme to bypass protective mechanisms set by the government, which results in the abuse and exploitation of household service workers.

“Most of the household service workers who took shelter at the Migrant Workers and Filipino Resource Center in Dubai were deployed using two visas,” Cacdac added.

In a previous statement, the POEA said household workers deployed using another visa were “not ready to work as household help because they have not undergone the process of training and certification and language and culture orientation.”

Cacdac said the Bureau of Immigration barred the agencies’ respective recruits from leaving the country after they were found in possession of two different visas.

He cited reports of BI showing that each of the three recruits of Al-Walih International were found to have two employment visas for United Arab Emirates bearing two different occupations. The workers apparently admitted that they knew their actual work was household service work and not what was stated in the documents processed by the POEA. Another OFW was found having visas for UAE and Jordan.

CAZ International, on the other hand, attempted to deploy six female workers but were also stopped at the airport by BI authorities. The workers bore separate UAE visas for salespersons and domestic workers.

The BI likewise intercepted a “manicurist” bound for Dubai, an OFW recruited by Hiro Global Manpower, who was also found having a visa meant for a household service worker.

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