Home Leave for Kasambahay in Singapore: Your Right, and the Levy Waiver That Makes It Cheaper

Two years into the job and you have not been home once. The plane ticket feels far off, the days never line up, and asking your employer feels like asking for a favour you have not earned. You have earned more than you think. Home leave sits in most contracts, and a quiet rebate makes it cheaper for your employer to say yes.

What home leave means

Singapore law does not hand a foreign domestic worker a fixed number of leave days the way office staff get annual leave. Your home leave is contractual. Whatever you and your employer wrote down when you signed is what binds both of you. That cuts both ways: if the contract promises a trip home every two years with a paid ticket, that promise holds.

MOM offers a common practice as a guide only: around 14 days of paid overseas leave for every two years worked, with the employer covering the return air ticket. Use that number as your anchor when you talk to your employer, and get any change in writing before you book.

If your contract says nothing about home leave, raise it now rather than the week you want to fly. A calm conversation months ahead beats a rushed one in December.

The levy waiver that helps your employer say yes

Few helpers know this part, and it can tip a hesitant employer toward yes. While you are overseas for at least seven days in a row, your employer stops paying the monthly levy for those days. MOM waives it.

At the standard levy of S$300 a month, that is about S$10 back for every day you are away. Two weeks home takes close to S$140 off the bill. A helper on the concessionary rate saves her employer less, but the waiver still counts. The trip home costs your employer less than the sticker price, and it helps to say so.

The same waiver applies when you are overseas on leave, so a real trip home qualifies. You cannot work in Singapore during those days, which a proper holiday already settles.

Who claims the waiver, and how

Your employer files it, not you, so bring them the facts. The whole thing runs online through the MOM FDW eService and takes about ten minutes when the dates and documents are ready. Your employer submits the dates you were overseas, and MOM adjusts the levy.

There is a deadline. The application has to go in within one year of the levy bill for the period you were away. Miss the window and the waiver is gone, so remind your employer to file soon after you land back.

Before you book the ticket

Talk early and put it in writing. Agree on the dates, who pays for the ticket, and how long you will be gone, then keep a copy. Save the message where your employer says yes, so the story stays the same later.

Check your pass and your papers. Your Work Permit has to stay valid across the trip, and your passport needs enough validity to fly. Sort your re-entry into Singapore with your employer before you leave, not at the airport.

Plan the money. If your contract puts the ticket on your employer, hold them to it without apology. If the cost sits with you, the ber-month fares climb fast, so book while seats are cheap.

Do this this week

Read your contract and find the home leave line. If it is there, name your dates to your employer and mention the levy waiver, since it lowers what the trip costs them. If it is not there, ask to add it in writing. Two years is a long time to go without a hug from your parents. The trip is more possible than it feels, and the rules are on your side more than you knew.