The government’s term, and the everyday words for it
Immigration’s own page for this work permit uses one specific term: Foreign Domestic Helper. It describes a foreign worker employed inside a single household, generally on a live-in basis, under a permit tied to that one household and role. Ordinary conversation shortens this in several directions — maid, helper, domestic worker in English; pembantu rumah in Bahasa Malaysia — and all of them describe the same underlying legal category, not different tiers of it.
This matters the first time you speak to an agency or fill in a form: use the term the document itself uses, and don’t assume a colloquial word carries a different meaning than the official one. If a term feels unclear, ask which permit category a role falls under — that detail is what actually separates one arrangement from another, not the word chosen to describe it.
- Use Foreign Domestic Helper or its abbreviation FDH on a government form or agency enquiry.
- Treat maid, helper and pembantu rumah as the same category in everyday conversation.
- Ask which permit category applies rather than relying on a colloquial term alone.
Roles that sound similar but sit in a different category
A nanny is usually understood as a childcare-specific role — hired for one or more children, rather than the household-wide mix of housekeeping and care an FDH role generally covers. A home nurse sits in a different category again, typically associated with medical-adjacent or qualified nursing-type care that falls outside what a domestic helper’s role is understood to include. Each has its own dedicated glossary entry on this site, because folding either into a domestic helper’s role is one of the more common ways a household’s expectations end up mismatched with what’s actually been arranged.
A local part-time cleaner is a different case again: that kind of arrangement typically doesn’t involve a foreign-worker permit at all, so the permit and process details covered elsewhere on this site don’t apply to it. If what you actually want is a few hours of cleaning a week rather than a live-in household role, this permit route isn’t the right starting point.
The permit terms behind the everyday word
Behind the everyday word sits a specific paper trail: an approval to hire, a visa category for entry, and an ongoing permit that has to be renewed for the arrangement to stay valid. Each of those has its own precise name in the process, and using the right one saves time when you’re asking a specific question rather than a general one.
This site keeps a dedicated glossary entry for the permit itself and for the related roles named above, so you can look up the exact term relevant to a specific question instead of reading a full guide for a single definition.
Why the exact term matters once you’re ready to talk to someone
A conversation with an agency moves faster once you can name what you’re actually asking for — a live-in helper for household duties and care, rather than a nanny, a home nurse, or a part-time cleaner. It also helps you read a quotation correctly: a fee itemised for this specific permit category is quoting for a defined process, not a general service.
If a term used in a conversation or a document doesn’t match anything above, that’s worth asking about directly before you go further — a mismatched term is sometimes the first sign that an arrangement isn’t quite what it initially sounded like.