What are the essential conditions that teachers should insist upon ? There must be a minimum list that management must meet in order to hire and retain you as a teacher.

Any failure on the part of the school would be cause for the teacher to leave immediately without advanced notice. The teacher would only be required to indicate the time and date that the school violated the contractual terms.

1) The school must be registered and licensed appropriately with all relevant government departments.

2) The school must provide the appropriate working visa for the teacher (Z Visa?). The school is responsible to establish and maintain the legal status of the teacher in compliance with Chinese laws. The teacher may be liable in law with respect to the Chinese State but the school is responsible for this in terms of the employment contract.

3) The school must provide a schedule in advance for all wage payments and a list of the deductions to be made. This would eliminate the sort of monkey business that many people report where a school traps the teacher because they don't have the money to leave. This is important in the West as nobody should work for a company that can not meet payroll on the due date. In the West failure to meet payroll means that the business has failed and is effectively bankrupt. This is important for employees because secured creditors are paid before unsecured creditors (such as includes employees and pensioners).

4) I think that teachers should get a video receipt for their passport before they turn it over to a school for visa application purposes. This will be important if the passport goes 'missing'. The video should be saved on the Internet, out of reach of the employer.

5) The maximum number of working hours should be agreed to in advance and adhered to. You can always be a good employee and remain flexible to a certain point because we are all in the real world but abuse of this condition should be cause for the teacher to leave after a short warning period.

6) The accommodation provided must be clean, properly maintained and secure. All payments to the landlord are the responsibility of the employer. The landlord should be provided with a statement to this effect by the employer with a copy for the employee.

7) The employer may not enter the employee's accommodation without advance notice to the employee.

The employer has certain expectations that must be met by the employee. For example, intoxication in the workplace, or failure to report for work due to intoxication or drug abuse are almost always cause for immediate dismissal. In the more tolerant West, in some workplaces the employer may require the employee to participate in appropriate treatment through mandatory referral. Repeated abuse is cause for dismissal.

What others are there ?