Starting Sunday, employers and individuals will have to submit their recruitment applications online at the Labor Ministry’s website through a new service, said Labor Minister Adel Fakeih on Saturday.

According to a statement, the new service will be implemented in two phases. In the first phase, employers, establishments and individuals can submit their recruitment applications electronically.

They will be given appointments to submit the required documents at the labor offices. In the second phase, the ministry officials will electronically review the recruitment requests as well as the submitted documents and the applicants will receive SMSes about them.

This new service preconditions that employers and individuals will have to update their database in order to benefit from this service. However, the ministry will have all applications registered in order to be followed up by the ministry’s staff following the submission of all required documents.

Once the application is accepted, the labor offices will send messages to applicants notifying them about the approval and telling them to complete the formalities. However, if the applicant does not meet the ministry’s appointment deadline, the application will be automatically cancelled and the applicant will have to go through the process again by resubmitting a new recruitment request.

Yehia Al-Maqboul, chairman of Recruitment Committee at the Jeddah Chamber for Commerce and Industry, told Arab News: “The new service covers all recruitment requests including the recruitment of housemaids. This step reflects the ministry’s efforts to facilitate the recruitment process of workers.”

He added: “The services will ease the rush of citizens seeking recruitment of new workers at the ministry’s premises and will definitely ease off the time and efforts exerted in the recruitment. At the same time, this mechanism will streamline the scheduling of appointments.”

Previously, the ministry had issued new regulations governing the Ajeer system, which regulates the recruitment of human resources for different facilities in the public and private sectors.

Under the Ajeer system, individuals and companies can employ workers who are not under their sponsorship without violating the labor law and residency law. As long as they do not fall under the red category, companies are allowed to lend one or more of their workers to other employers in the construction, real estate, maintenance, institute and colleges, charitable organizations, and Qur’an memorization centers.