Thursday 19 / September / 2024
Muscat: In 60 days, 1,815 complaints were filed online at the Ministry of Manpower, a senior official said.
On average, this comes to around 30 complaints per day.
“From September 1 until November 1, we have registered 1,815 complaints online from workers all across Oman. Many of the complaints were reviewed and immediate action was taken by the departments concerned to address the issues,” the senior official added.
From September 3, the Ministry of Manpower provided a platform to national and expatriate workers in Oman to file labour complaints online through the Ministry of Manpower’s (MoM’s) portal www.manpower.gov.om.
The system which was already online in Muscat was widened to cover other regions too.
In June, the Times of Oman had reported first that the ministry has opened an online platform for workers to submit their complaints.
During the initial phase, 512 people used the complaint portal. During its first phase, the portal was in Arabic and on August 2, the platform was made available in English also.
According to the ministry, through the online platform, labour complaints can be submitted and updates on labour law violations can be sought.
The online complaint platform states that the complainant should not delay lodging his claim, as per Article 7 of the Labour Law.
Article 7 states that the employee’s right to make any claim under the provision of this law shall expire after a year from the date on which such a claim arose.
Regarding cases instituted before the implementation of this law, the one-year deadline will commence from the date on which the law came into force.
The online platform also clearly points out that an employer cannot act against the complainant for approaching MoM to lodge a complaint.
While explaining the current practice, a legal advisor in Muscat said another way to register a labour complaint is that the complainant approaches the Labour Dispute Department and fills out the form available there with all the details about the complainant, employer and labour claims.
According to the manpower official, other than the online registration of a complaint, all other procedures will remain the same.
A trade union leader in Muscat said that online complaint system has become a handy tool for the workers.
“Submitting a complaint earlier was quite difficult. When the online platform was opened, it has become easy for the workers,” Mohammed Al Khaldi, the trade unionist, said.
