Manifesto for Zero Fees in the Recruitment Process

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Support Fair and Ethical Recruitment
Manifesto for Zero Fees in the Recruitment Process

We call on all governments and non-state actors to uphold fair and ethical recruitment of migrant workers. Recruitment should take place in a way that protects human rights, mitigates social costs and upholds core labor standards. Governments must regulate recruitment and scrap recruitment fees and related costs charged to workers. It is the employers who must bear the costs of recruiting workers, not the workers themselves. Recruiters often charge both the employer and the worker for their services. Rather than charging the workers, employers should be responsible for costs associated with any services rendered by recruitment agencies. There are countries in the world that prohibit charging of recruitment fees to migrant workers. There are ethical recruiters who do not charge recruitment fees.

We urge competent government authorities to take bolder measures against abusive and fraudulent recruitment practices, including the collection of excessive recruitment fees. Many of the abuses stem from the lack of transparency and accountability in the recruitment process. We believe that the entire recruitment process and employment contracts should be clear, transparent and understandable to migrant workers.

We call on governments to ensure that workers have access to free, comprehensive and accurate information regarding their rights and the conditions of their recruitment and employment.

We support adequately funded and staffed public services in order to ensure that recruitment practices are regularly monitored and regulatory policies are effectively enforced.

We call on governments to guarantee workers’ access to effective grievance and other dispute resolution mechanisms in cases of abuse of their rights in the recruitment process.

We call on countries of origin and destination to ratify and implement key international instruments to protect the rights of migrants in the recruitment process, during their work placements, and upon return to their countries of origin.

These instruments include:

• UN Convention for the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of their Families
• ILO Convention 87: Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organize
• ILO Convention 97: Migration for Employment
• ILO Convention 98: Right to Organize and Collective Bargaining Convention
• ILO Convention 143: Migrant Workers (Supplementary Provisions) Convention
• ILO Convention 151: Labour Relations (Public Service) Convention
• ILO Convention 181: Private Employment Agencies Convention
• ILO Convention 189: Decent Work for Domestic Workers, and the different conventions against forced labor.
• We represent trade unions, migrant workers groups, civil society organizations, recruiters, employers and governments who are working together to make recruitment ethical and fair.

We join efforts to raise awareness, hold campaigns, advocate for rights-based policies, unionize workers and engage in social dialogue towards the abolition of recruitment fees.

Protect Migrant Workers Rights! Put Workers Before Profits!
Set Workers Free from Exploitation and Debt Bondage!
Abolish Recruitment Fees!
#NoRecruitmentFees

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 More information:

• Campaign: Support Fair and Ethical Recruitment
• Manifesto for Zero Fees in the Recruitment Process – [Download a PDF]
• What are recruitment fees and why they should be abolished - [Download a PDF]
• Campaign posters
• Video: Recruitment fees are unjust
• Video: Zero Fees in the recruitment process
• PSI website: Migration and Refugees