Probation for a domestic worker: what it can and cannot do

Many employers start a new domestic worker "on trial for three months". That is allowed, and it is sensible: you get time to see whether the arrangement works. But a lot of people believe probation means they can let the person go at any time, for any reason, with no notice. That is not the law, and getting it wrong is one of the commonest ways a household ends up at the CCMA.

What probation is

• It is a set period at the start of the job during which you check whether your employee can do the work and is suitable for it. The 2025 Code of Good Practice: Dismissal (Part E) describes it as a period during which a newly hired employee's "performance and suitability for employment are evaluated".
• It must be decided in advance. Put it in the written contract before your employee starts, with the length: "The first three months are a probation period."
• It must be a reasonable length for the job. The Code does not set a number of months. It says the period should take into account the nature of the job and the time needed to evaluate suitability.
• It cannot be used to avoid permanent employment. Letting someone go at the end of probation for reasons unrelated to the work, and then hiring the next person on probation, is "inconsistent with the purpose of probation" and may be an unfair dismissal.

What probation does not change

A probation clause does not switch off any of the law. From the first day:

• Minimum wage: at least R30.23 an hour from 1 March 2026. There is no lower "trial rate".
• UIF: if your employee works 24 hours or more a month for you, you register and pay 1% + 1% from the first month. See UIF for domestic workers, step by step.
• COIDA: domestic workers have been covered since the Constitutional Court's 2020 Mahlangu judgment, probation or not.
• Sick leave: in the first six months your employee earns one paid sick day for every 26 days worked. Probation does not make sick days unpaid.
• Annual leave starts building up from the first day, and must be paid out for the days earned if the job ends.
• A payslip every pay day - see what must be on a domestic worker's payslip.

Your side of the deal: guidance

The Code says that during probation you must give reasonable guidance to help your employee do the job well. That may include instruction, training or counselling, sized to the job and to the employer. For a household this is not a training programme. It is:

• Show how you want things done in the first week: which rooms, which products, the children's routine, what is off limits.
• Say early when something is not right, and say specifically what you want instead.
• Check in at set points - for example at the end of week two, month one and month two - and write a few lines down each time: what is going well, what needs to change, by when.

Those short notes are your evidence. If you later decide not to confirm the job, the first thing a commissioner will ask is: what did you tell your employee was wrong, and what help did you give?

Ending the job during or at the end of probation

• The reason must be about the work or suitability - poor work, unreliability, conduct. The Code says the reasons accepted during probation can be less compelling than for a permanent employee, because the point of probation is evaluation. Less compelling is not "no reason".
• You must hear your employee first. Before deciding to end the job or extend probation, the Code requires you to give your employee an opportunity to make representations, and to consider them.
• Extending is an option. If the work is improving but not there yet, you may extend probation instead of dismissing - again after hearing your employee, and in writing, with a new end date.
• Notice still applies (next section), and so do the final pay rules: pay for days worked, leave earned and notice. See ending a domestic worker's job.
• Your employee can still go to the CCMA. A dispute about a dismissal during probation is usually heard as con-arb - conciliation and arbitration on the same day. Our CCMA guide for domestic employers covers what to bring.

The notice period: why a six-month probation can cost you

Under section 37 of the Basic Conditions of Employment Act, notice depends on how long your employee has worked for you:

• Six months or less: at least one week's notice.
• A domestic worker employed more than six months: at least four weeks' notice - six months sooner than most other employees, who reach four weeks only after a year.

So for a domestic worker, the six-month mark is a cliff. A probation that runs past six months means that ending the job at the end of it needs four weeks' notice, not one.

Worked example: full-time, at the minimum wage

• Hours: 45 a week at R30.23 an hour.
• Monthly pay: R30.23 x 45 x 52 / 12 = R5,894.85.
• A week's pay: R5,894.85 x 3 / 13 = R1,360.35.
• Ending the job at three months: one week's notice, worth R1,360.35.
• Ending the job at seven months: four weeks' notice, worth R5,441.40 - four times as much.

The calculator below is set to three months. Change "Time with this employer" to 7 to see the jump.

Calculator by CalcSA - open the notice period calculator if it does not load.

Notice can be worked as normal, or you can pay it out instead of having your employee work it (section 38). Either way it is owed. A contract can give more notice than the law, never less.

A short probation clause

Something like this, in the written contract, is enough:

How HomeHR helps

• The HomeHR contract maker gives you the written particulars of employment to sign before day one, with an optional probation clause built in - enter the number of months and it adds the wording above, guidance and the right to respond included.
• The payslip maker produces a correct payslip from the first pay day, including UIF once your employee's hours reach 24 a month.
• See sick leave and family responsibility leave for how leave builds up in the first six months.

General information, not legal advice. Every figure we use is on the rates page with its source.