Here are some 'management' tips to help you cope with the help. Do this, and chances of fireworks and your maid getting up and leaving will be much less.

As everyone who has ever kept full-time maids at home knows, dealing with them can be a real challenge. It is often harder to manage household help than it is to manage subordinates in the office! Here are some 'management' tips to help you cope with servant situations. Do this, and chances of fireworks and your maid getting up and leaving will be much less.

Discourage your maid from bringing relatives over, especially if you have a new servant. Even though your maid may be honest, some of her relatives may not be, and you don't want them strolling in and out of your house all the time. If they come to meet her, you can send her down to speak to them.

If you have a servant's quarter, make it clear that no one other than the servant who works for you can live in it without your permission. Of course, if your servant has just one young daughter or a small child you could consider if you want to take both of them on before hiring her. Your servant should never try and spring something like this on you after being hired.

Keep a key of the servant's quarters with you, and if the entrance to the quarters is through the house, don't give your servant a key to the quarters.

Don't keep changing servants too frequently. You never know when you get someone with harmful intentions.

Don't leave little children alone with new servants. Also, if you have a daughter, don't leave her alone in the house with a male servant, no matter for how long he has been working with you.

Don't ever give your servants an advance in their salary. No matter what the excuse, no benefit has ever resulted from doing this. Ninety percent of the time the excuse is a hoax and you will never see the servant again. Even if the servant does return, chances are that he will then not be serious about work, because he knows that you will not throw him out until you recover the advance. So, make it a rule in the house that your servant will not, under any circumstances, get an advance from you. If your servant has worked with you for a long time and is more a member of your family than anything else, then of course the situation is different, but if she is relatively new, then don't encourage it. If you do give it, then consider it as an act of charity and be open to the prospect that you may never get it back.

It's best to lay down the rules of work right in the beginning. Let her know how many days she gets off in a month or in a year. If she takes off once a week, then is she entitled to a month of paid leave in a year? Discuss this at the outset so there is no showdown or confusion later on.

All the little things that she may need, like oil for her hair, or a comb - will you provide them or will she buy them herself from her own money? It is best if you just fix a particular salary and lay off the perks, because the end result may be that both of you end up feeling disgruntled. Get her soap for washing her hands and for bathing, and leave it at that.