Qatar's wage protection system to benefit low-income workers

Qatar has issued a mandatory online wage payment system for low-income private sector workers which would benefit expatriate labours, including from India.
Qatar's new Wage Protection System (WPS) is set to bring much needed transparency to the payments of low-income employees, particularly in the construction sector.
In February 2015, Qatar issued a mandatory online wage payment system for low-income private sector workers and gave companies a six-month period to comply with the new system, which was then postponed until November.
Qatar's total population is 2.3 million that includes an estimated 2 million migrant workers. Indians make up over 6.3 lakh of the country's total population, an Indian official said.

"Under the new system all employee salaries will need to be paid directly from the employer's local Qatari account into the Qatari account of the employee. WPS is aimed at protecting workers and ensuring their salaries are paid into a bank account in Qatar as per their labour contract," said Links Group, one of Qatar's leading providers of commercial facilitation and advisory services.
"The new WPS is one of the many steps Qatar is taking to protect their migrant labour force. While all Qatari-based businesses must comply with WPS, the construction sector is likely to be impacted the most since it accounts for 40 per cent of the country's migrant workforce, many of whom are low-income earners," said John Martin, founding partner of Links Group.

"It is also a sector that has come under criticism for late or non-payment of salaries to employees. With WPS now in place, the government will be able to reconcile the employees sponsored by the company to their labour contracts and finally to the bank salary transfer. In this way appropriate action can be taken against companies who do not meet their salary obligations to staff," Martin said.