Amendment to Act to have service charge for foreign funds

A bill has been introduced to Parliament to amend the Employment Act, where it will be required to pay service charges to resort employees via the currency they initially obtained, with service charge payments in MVR to be halted.

Kendhoo constituency MP and MDP member Mauroof Zakir introduced the bill, with it stating that Article 52 of the Employment Act is to be amended to state that service charge payments to employees are not to be given after exchanging it to MVR.

And so, the bill states that employees are to receive service charge payments via the currency they initially receive.

The bill also includes resorts, guesthouses, services outsourced by hotels and employees from other companies.

As per the bill, service charges are to be paid to outsourced employees if they directly serve tourists at tourist facilities.

It is common to have another company run a Maldivian resorts watersports center, dive center and souvenir shops. Such employees are to receive the same service charge given to the resort employees. Their salaries will not be given by the resort.

Mauroof said that the reason he introduced the bill is that while the law stipulates that after service charges are taken from tourism industry services, it is to be distributed amongst employees. However, the service charges tend to be exchanged to MVR, with this causing difficulties in benefiting employees.

And so, the bill was introduced so that employees can benefit fully from service charges.