Dubai, UAE, 3rd November 2015: The new Qatar Wage Protection System (WPS), which comes into effect this month, is set to bring much needed transparency to the payments of low-income employees, particularly in the construction sector, according to Links Group, one of Qatar’s leading providers of commercial facilitation and advisory services. 

In February 2015, the government of 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. 

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. 

Commenting on the new decree John Martin St. Valery, founding partner of Links Group said: “The new Wages Protection System 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% of the country’s migrant workforce, many of whom are low-income earners. 

“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.”