To feel completely betrayed by staff member

You haven’t answered any questions about contracts etc which makes me think they haven’t signed one? Taking emotion out of it - hard I know as you’ve been betrayed by a friend - think about your business now. If there is no contract stipulation about clients then they haven’t done anything wrong (only morally!) except for claiming double pay - again you haven’t confirmed this though? Do they get paid if they don’t turn up? You could try and reclaim this if they have been claiming sick pay from you whilst working for themselves. Not sure how easy it would be though.

Did you go to the client's house this morning?

This is gross misconduct. If it was my business I would recruit new staff as quick as possible and sort out the rota to cover their cleans. Ask them to come and meet “in the next hour” telling them to bring all keys as there’s been an issue with key holding “at the office” or whatever and there’s a need to account for all keys. When they arrive account for all the keys then dismiss them both (with no notice) telling them what you know and that you will take legal action against them if any further contact with clients is made and if you discover that they’d retained any keys, company property etc. Have a statement prepared for all the clients saying that everything is in hand and that whilst Ann and daughter have left the business (no need to detail why) very experienced staff have already been recruited to take over. I’d also go with new staff members to meet the clients as a handover for the first cleans if time allows. I would also contact each client by phone or in person to discuss any concerns. You’re more likely to retain the business by having personal contact. Good luck OP, so annoying to be taken for a ride when it’s your business they’re stealing!

I'd advertise for new employees. I'd remove their ability to use your stuff and kit. Bit by bit ease them out - fewer and fewer hours.

When you have a new team. Confront them. Ask for their company's name because you nwed to send an invoice for using your kit/stuff. Then sack them both for gross misconduct. Notify HMRC that they have other jobs so HMRC require tax returns from them.

What a pair of AHs. Greed has no bounds!

Chuck them out and get your stuff back, also contact the people you know they have pinched and explain the situation .

Check what is in their contracts. Get advice,Accas or legal ,i have a trade body that i can ask for advice regarding employees.Don't do anything without making sure of your facts, get evidence and document it. Once you have everything in place then set up a meeting. This is gross misconduct, also if they have taken client details it's breach of data protection. Don't be swayed by thinking that you are their friend. You are their employer and this is your business
You are better off without them. You will find better staff. Good luck

They are stealing from you and it would be a police matter.

Consult a lawyer
sack them immediately
hire new people asap

I'm fuming with my blood boiling for you, and I don't even know 'ard faced Anne and her devious daughter.
I hope it works out for you 🙏

A very good point about the dishonesty involved. I bet most of this lady's customers would be appalled to know that Ann and her daughter have keys which frankly they have gained fraudulently.

Ann is bitch. Hope karma bites them on the backside. I'd be sending a letter to the households that Ann cleans to say they may be getting another cleaner as you are juggling things around. That will let the householders know that you are the boss and not Ann.

Thank you. It wouldn't go down in some big city law firm, so why should it be OK for the owner of a cleaning company to have her private client list pinched?

They were only there because they were her employees. If they sent flyers out to the entire town and some of those who responded happened to be OPs clients then so be it.

But she deliberately targeted someone already using the service in order to poach them.

Yep. And your clients are your Intellectual Property - your IP.

Some good advice here OP, YANBU & good luck 👍

In summary, gather as much evidence as possible, limit the damage, get your equipment returned, confront them with a witness (& record it on your phone), and subsequently communicate with clients keeping things factual but do alert clients to their dishonest behaviour (assuming & only if you have proof of same!! ).

I would hold the threat of legal action over them rather than doing it. The return ing of keys by dishonest employees may be a police matter if they refuse, inform them of this at the meeting & threaten to call the police if they refuse.

P.s. lastly I would possibly consider the hmrc thing but I'd leave that for now and how they manage returning keys, equipment & clients, and also bear in mind you might get a visit yourself. So that could also be reserved as a threat to illicit full co-operation from these prize Cs.

@BurpeesAllTheWay I have to wonder if Ann's friendliness was a way to pump you for information and stay on your good side while she and her DD take you for a ride.

I hope you can get it worked out. I would call the clients that have cancelled to ask why so you can better your business. Get the keys back with the "insurance reason" and figure out a way to get the cleaning stuff back. Do they have keys to the business? If so, could they have taken other cleaning supplies to use on their private clients?

Good luck, OP. I feel for you.

Talk to a solicitor, could be classed as industrial espionage. Also, when you sack them, charge for the supplies they have been using and advise those clients that what the ex employees have done is illegal

I’m self-employed (totally different industry) and some agencies I subcontract with have it as part of the contract that I will not work with their client directly for a period of X years after I’ve been booked through their agency.

Do you have anti-poaching measures built into your employee contracts, @BurpeesAllTheWay ?

Their behaviour is gross misconduct.

Are they on a zero hours contract?
Have you got a non-compete clause in their contract?
Have you paid them any sick pay?

Do u think the clients approached anne and her daughter and said would you work direct for me for cheaper? Just a thought

IME, @CleaningAngel, it's equally likely that the cleaner - hoping for the slot for herself - spun some story about how awful OP is and that she was only getting paid a tenner an hour, and that a "private" arrangement would work better for them both

The "greedy bastard boss" trope is a popular one, as countless threads on here show, so while actually being dishonest this would have enabled both to convince themselves they were striking a blow for justice and sticking it to someone who was just taking advantage

@BurpeesAllTheWay make sure you report them to HMRC as well for the backdated period when all this began.

In future, also don’t mix business with pleasure. They’re not your colleagues after all, you’re their boss. There’s a certain type of person that interprets kindness as weakness and harbours resentment at having to work for someone else - and I think those two CFs had those traits!

You have to be very careful in this situation.

I’m guessing that being a very small company, doing everything yourself on a tight budget, you don’t have water-tight employment contracts (maybe even only verbal contacts with your employees especially if they were friends you trusted)
I’m guessing you can’t afford legal advice either and don’t want to go down that route anyway.

I think the best way to deal with this situation is from the point of view of friendships, rather than of being her employer.

Yes, Ann has betrayed you big time and isn’t a friend at all. But expect no recourse to her betrayal, from a business point of view. Slowly drop her as a friend.
She was able to betray you easily because you paid more attention to making sure cleaning needs were met properly rather than to your admin side of the business.
This is a steep learning curve for you OP, and now you know you have to have watertight admin in case this happens again. Don’t let it deter you though. Instead, let it spur you on. You have done well to get this far with your sheer hard work.

1. Get your equipment back telling Ann and anybody else you suspect, that you want to replace/upgrade it.
2. Create a new policy and procedure for key holding. Do your research on that first.
3. And then simply don’t give her more work through your company. If she asks and I doubt she will be so hard faced, tell her that you are looking for new clients and will get back to her when you have work for her.
4. And obviously don’t hold on to the friendship. But don’t accuse her of anything either. Keep it light.
5. invoice each of your clients as normal and ask them for a feed back review of cleaning and of admin ..that is to make sure they understand the process of payment going to you and not direct to the cleaner. See if that throws anything up for you to improve your admi and also of course about what may have been going on so that you can be better prepared.
6. Hold as much evidence as you can glean, but don’t do anything with it. Just bide your time and hopefully Ann will disappear from your radar. You will only need it, if she kicks off (out of guilt)

Good honest cleaners are hard to source and you have a chance to make a go of it again. So onwards and upwards.
Good luck!

Do u think the clients approached anne and her daughter and said would you work direct for me for cheaper? Just a thought.
Also re sacking them are the on paye and been with u longer than 2 years. If so there is strict procedure to go through before you just bin them off

If the op has been paying the staff and the non paying Customer (for whom op has asked for keys back) has also been paying Ann then there is fraud there - not huge fraud i grant you but that is theft.

It is stealing data because they only know that person exists and they are only in their house because they are under OP's employment. I just can't believe that isn't illegal use of company data?