Hiring Local Staff in Chad

If you are fortunate enough to be able to hire local staff while living overseas, chosing the right person and following the hiring process is critical.  My friends in Uganda seem to run into problems with staff every six-months that lead to returning to the searching and hiring process.  Here in Chad I am able to hire a gardner and may hire a housekeeper if I can find the right person.  Thankfully I was able to hire the gardner of a friend who was departing N'Djamena, however his housekeeper disappeared so I was not able to hire her as well.  

In Chad, a contract is required for all workers, even part-time, and the contract has to be registered with the state.  The employer is required to contribute 16% of the employees contribution to a state retirement fund and the employee also contributes 4% (for a total of 20% of the employees pay).  Employees are also entitiled to sick days, annual leave, emergency leave, special leave (for births, marriages, funerals) and annual bonuses.  The contract even stipulates the rates of overtime if my employee is asked to work more than the hours specified in the contract.

Salaries depend on what you ask your employee to do and the hours you ask them to work.  For example;a gardner working 20 hours per week may earn 60,000 CFA / $120 per month.  A gardner also responsible for pool maintainence (many expats have pools in N'Djamena) could earn 100,000 CFA / $200 per month.  A housekeeper working three-days a week may earn 75,000 CFA / $150 per month.  There are no general guidelines or recommended salaries but one should remember that the employee is most likely supporting many people with this salary.  A Senegalese housekeeper I knew in Dakar was supporting 18 people with her wages, including putting two nephews through college.