To expect the cleaner to have done more....

[toots111]

I am trialling a new cleaner. Our house is not particularly clean nor a hovel. The cleaner said she needed to do a deep clean before regular weekly cleans. In 3 hours they did 2 bedrooms and a small bathroom. They are pretty clean now but I kind of expected more for 3 hours. AIBU?

[MissTwister]

No. My cleaner does my whole 2 bed house and ironing in 2.5 hours. Obviously not a deep clean but good enough

[LillyBugg]

Doesn't sound like a good clean for three hours worthy unless your house was exceptionally dirty? My cleaner did a deep clean in 3 hours and does a regular clean in two. Two bedrooms, dining, lounge, kitchen and bathroom. She hovers, mops and dusts plus cleaning the bathroom and kitchen.

[LillyBugg]

She doesn't hover. That would be bad. She hoovers.

[Domino777]

What did the deep clean involve?

[Akire]

What had she done? If she pulled out every bit of furniture be the beds dusted abd tidyed hovered then sounds about right.

If she just hoovered around funiture and flicked a duster then no.

[InTheBox]

Poor you OP

[Branleuse]

Can you say something?

Say I was wondering if thats normal for 3 hours work, or ask her if she would mind doing an all over superficial clean and then deep clean with the remainder of the time

[MrsPnut]

Our cleaner does a three bed/ 4 reception room house in three hours each week. She only gives the bedrooms the quickest going over but the rest of the house is pretty clean. I do pay extra every few weeks for pulling out furniture and getting the woodwork cleaned etc.

[AliveAlone]

You don't have to have a deep clean first. If you don't want one tell her to skip it and go straight to regular weekly cleans.

I am a cleaner. I have never told a customer that I have to do a deep clean, but will do them if requested. You are paying her for a service so it is your choice. You need to be clear about what you want from her.

3 hours for the deep clean you describe sounds reasonable to me, if she did a good job of it.

[toffeeboffin]

Our cleaner does two bedrooms, two bathrooms, huge floor space, kitchen, dusting and mopping floor in three hours. The house looks pretty mint after she's been.

[strongwhitetea]

Ignore inthebox, she's a bit cranky.

[toffeeboffin]

FFS inthebox

[DanglyEarOrnaments]

We are a cleaning service and we will not have a client if they do not have a deep clean first. Then we hand over the home to our teams to take care of knowing it is up-together for them to maintain with our regular services.

This is not the only way to offer a cleaning service but we are a premium level of service and it is the only way to get a house to the standard that we are selling. it depends what service level you are happy with really. Our business model supports a very high level of service.

Our initial cleans take two cleaners from three to six hours (six to twelve man-hours) to complete a full house, depending on size and condition of the home. We would never expect a member of staff to do one of our initial cleans alone as it is not possible.

[TudorTrace]

Bran you're joking?

[DanglyEarOrnaments]

Just seen Bran's post - rolling about laughing now "with the remainder of the time" just slip in a l'il old deep clean - oh that's cracked me up. Ours take all day usually (for a team of two!)

[toots111]

thanks all. It's pretty clean but some things not done like picture rails. The agreement was 3hrs this week then 2 people doing 2 hours next week so 7 man hours but we still have another 2 bedrooms, a main bathroom and all the downstairs to go so I just thought more would get done in the time. never had a cleaner before but can't face dusting any more because of my lungs so it's all new to me. Maybe I'll just wait till after next week and see where we're at.

[hefzi]

I used to be a cleaner: that sounds reasonable to me for a deep clean. I used to hate starting off in a new house without deep-cleaning, tbh - so I used to do it anyway, and for the first week, my employers thought I was stupidly slow. But I hated just flicking the grot about - and as I was still only getting paid for four hours or whatever, they usually sucked it up: and were then delighted with their super-clean home that was so much quicker to clean the following weeks. (Put it this way- I was never got rid off!)

I have a very small home now, and clean regularly - but I still do a deep clean every six months, which takes hours and hours and hours (a spruce up clean, by comparison - around an hour and a half: 2 bedrooms, one bathroom, tiny kitchen). My DM is always bloody deep cleaning, but that's her choice as she decided to jack in having a cleaner when she became semi-retired, because she was irritated at paying out money for something she could do: I keep telling her normal people don't wash all the china, paintwork, skirting boards, walls etc every month - but her eight bedroomed-- home, her choice. It takes a long time to clean properly, in all honesty - if you're just titivating, that's one thing but clean clean rather than superficially clean takes an age.

[janethegirl2]

Washing walls every month....wtf .

Mine never get washed unless I'm going to paint them.

[hefzi]

(Though I would expect a deep clean to include the picture rails, picture glass and frames, taking the books off shelves etc etc)

[Yika]

It seems reasonable to me and actually a good way to proceed. My cleaner does the superficial weekly clean - perfectly well - but I then deep clean room by room from time to time, and it takes ages.

[Havalina1]

What is classed as a deep clean?

Our cleaner does a three bedroom, two bathroom House every week in two hours. She does floors, polishing, hoovers everything - door frames, ceilings, the tiled kitchen floor.

The shower and bath is very well cleaned... She doesn't do any laundry, no bed making, no tidying up after our daily stuff.... No fluffing cushions...

I'd another cleaner before her who was a great tidier; it was lovely to walk in to the place all tidy, except it was undone in one day and not really cleaned behind it all - bathrooms were never done thoroughly. I got sick of asking for the other approach and made up a lie and let her go (and felt awful about it as she was so nice).

[skankingpiglet]

We've had a cleaner start today too, having never had one before. Like you our house isn't a hovel, but after 2 months of bad morning sickness and a toddler causing destruction wherever she goes, it's far from sparklingly clean.
In 2hrs 15mins she deep cleaned the kitchen/diner (not inside the cupboards though), utility room, downstairs loo, and bathroom. She mopped the tiled floors and did a very quick hoover with the little time she had left. We are really happy with what she's done, there's no way I could have done that much in the time. I expect next week she'll keep on top of what she's already done and tackle the dust-hell that are the bedrooms, and from then on it'll just be mostly maintenance.
I think what you've had done sounds reasonable if the bedrooms had stuff over the floor that had to be cleared before she could clean ours do, but you need a few more weeks to fully judge.

[janethegirl2]

I guess it depends if you want tidy or clean.

[hefzi]

jane I agree - but my DM has "issues"

[Branleuse]

im not joking. I mean deep clean areas if shes got time after doing a normal clean. I dont mean deep clean the whole house.

I dont see the point of having a cleaner that is way too thorough at the expense of actually making the house just look ok. I actually got rid of a cleaner for spending ages deep cleaning fucking everything all the time, including places noone ever sees. I want a cleanish and tidy house, and then if theres any time left over, then sure, do skirting boards and behind radiators and cupboards etc