Every apartment needs a small workforce to ensure smooth functioning of all its moving parts. These personnel work to make sure the apartment is clean, secure and problem free and all fundamental entitlements to a resident is available without any issues.
Hiring this blue collar workforce is as difficult a task as hiring any white collar professional, if not tougher. The general norm is to hire these people through an agency who specializes in manpower placements. While this process saves a lot of time and effort, apartment association members should also make sure they are compliant with labor laws of the state.
So here are our 5 key points to consider while hiring your apartment workforce
- Verification - Whether you hire your workforce directly or through an agency, please ensure identity verification and background checks for all personnel in your apartment. This process involves police verification of each of the personnel working in your apartment. You must demand this information from your agency or you may work with a background check company who will get the verification done and give you a report. If you are hiring them directly on a daily wage basis, please ensure you have a copy of their identity verification documents and their proof of address.
- Minimum Wage Law - Every state has pre-defined minimum wages for blue collar workforce that helps to protect them from inflation and exploitation. Please ensure that you adhere to these laws and pay your workforce the correct amount of salary. Many apartments have frequent run-ins with labor inspectors who slap a huge fine on the association for not following the minimum wage norms. The fines are significantly higher than the difference in amount you might have saved by not paying minimum wage to your workforce.
- Clear definition of work - Prepare a list of activities that are relevant to your apartment community. Most of the activities are common across all apartments but there may be custom tasks for your community. Clearly define them, create a schedule and appraise every worker of their responsibilities. Get a signed acknowledgement from your agency so that he is held accountable for any deviations or missteps in the aforementioned tasks.
- ESI & PF - An additional component of ESI and PF has been added to the minimum wage requirements to protect the blue collar workforce from unforeseen events such as accidents and disfigurement at the location of employment. Please ensure that your workforce are being paid ESI/PF along with the salary. You can ask your agency to provide a monthly receipt of ESI and PF paid to the government for each employee stationed at your premises and submit the same in your auditory submissions to the Registrar of Societies. This component safeguards safeguards the apartment against labor compliance fines and medical expenses needed by the workforce in case of an accident or disfigurement during disbursement of his duties in your apartment.
- Clear Identification inside the premises - Ensure that all personnel in your apartment have a uniform that identifies them as the known entities. Every worker should report to the security desk at the start of the day and make an entry in the register for attendance and same process must be followed at the end of the during exit. Please have different uniforms for your security personnel and the rest of the staff. This process will enhance the safety quotient of your apartment. Ask your agency to provide uniforms for all personnel servicing your apartment.
Following these steps will help you manage your apartment workforce efficiently and be compliant with the law. For more information on workforce management, get in touch with us at [email protected]. You can also visit us at www.ecarma.in or call us at +91 9663165300