For maids working under hawk-eyed employers, the best times to make a run are when they are taking out the trash or sent to buy food.

Most times, Ms Tan is discreet with her help but she has even brazenly waited at a void deck to escort an abused maid to safety.

The chairman of the Archdiocesan Commission for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People (ACMI), Ms Tan also mans the organisation's 24-hour helpline.

This year, 24 callers have dialled the ACMI number, complaining of maid abusers.

While nine of these calls came from suffering maids, the 15 other calls were from strangers or neighbours and friends of the abused maids.

At the helpline of Transient Workers Count Too (TWC2), an advocacy group for migrant workers, four in 10 of the calls are from members of the public.

Some whistle-blowers even send pictures to the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) and to Stomp, the interactive portal of The Straits Times, to report abusers.

Last month, one employer was fined $4,000 after a picture of his maid perched precariously on a 10th-storey ledge, watering plants, was sent to the MOM.

'The public does play an important role and they're really starting to make the effort to be whistle-blowers,' said Ms Tan.

But some go further than just tip the authorities off.

When Ms C. Chia, 43, saw her neighbour's maid sleeping in the car porch, the marketing consultant sensed something was amiss.

The scrawny maid would also ask Ms Chia for food, claiming her employer fed her only once a day. The last straw was when she passed a suicide note to another neighbour's maid.

After seeking advice from the ACMI, Ms Chia and a neighbour got the abused maid to climb over the house fence and drove her to the police station.

'I didn't want to sour the relationship with my neighbour but I couldn't let the abuse go on,' said Ms Chia.

Running away, however, is not the first advice agencies give to callers on the helplines.

When maids call in, often speaking in trembling voices and whispered tones, agencies would first establish what their complaints are.

The bulk of the gripes are to do with insufficient food, unpaid salaries, physical and verbal abuse and being overworked.

The maids are usually advised to first voice their grievances to their employers. But many are so timid, they often do not and some even clam up and deny reports after the MOM or police have been called in.

As a last resort, these maids would then flee from their employers' homes, sometimes with the help of an agency or a neighbour.

While the bulk of the help- lines' complaints are genuine, there are the odd few false accusations.

Ms Sisi Sukiato, welfare officer at migrant welfare group Home, said: 'Sometimes, they call and make a false report because they're lonely and just want to go home.'