To refuse to buy bleach?

It's very easily available but here's a link

Build up of what though? If you're cleaning with other products, it's still clean! Hot soapy water is still sanitary.

Soap- washing up liquid.

What needs cleaning? What are you trying to achieve in cleaning it?

The thing is, it’s the place you eliminate waste. It’s literally the place for faeces and urine. How clean does it need to be? Soap is enough.

Soap and water cleans the outside. Soap (washing up liquid) and a brush cleans the inside. I swapped to a silicone brush and it’s useless. Ok for skids but useless for anything else. The old fashioned brush mechanically removes any mineral deposits, with the help of soap for any fatty deposits.

Have you got a link? It’s the one thing I haven’t tried.

What are people cleaning their toilet with if not bleach?

Citric acid. I use it for the bathroom and kettle/sink. For shower/sink,/bath, put it in a spray bottle. For the toilet, I tip it in overnight with some hot water but some just sprinkle it in. And for the bleach fiends - yes it kills germs.

I'm a fan of not polluting the earth any more than we are already doing, and have switched to eco friendly products as much as I can. As a biologist with a special interest in history who volunteers in a living museum, I can confirm that carbolic soap and water really does do a good job of hygiene. Vinegar doesn't perform too badly either.

The trouble is that the non-eco friendly versions have been developed to act faster than the eco versions and with less elbow grease. Victorians scrubbed for hours on their hands and knees, whereas we want to mop and be done in less than 10 minutes. I can understand a cleaner not having the desire to take the extra physical work or the time that eco stuff takes (read the contact time needed on your products folks, yes including the non-eco stuff!). She probably also feel that if she doesn't get the finish that she wants in your home, it reflects badly on her.

As an aside - if anybody has found a non-bleach way of removing stains under the water line in the loo, please do share it! I've been using a limescale loo cleaner, thinking it was limescale, but it's not working.

Useful to know. 👍

When I’ve been a cleaner and some of the eco friendly ones you may as well spray water as it just dampens dirt. I did clean a super eco holiday let and white vinegar was my go to product, bicarbonate of soda. I used to use lots of microfibre / eglass polishing cloths so microplastics galore though.

My personal favourite is dettol bathroom spray with oxi action. It would lift off all those copper stains that seem set into the enamel of buildings with interesting private water supplies. No bleach so might be a compromise ?

Had this conversation with my cleaner last week. She likes to use it to clean our kitchen sink and we have agreed to trial completely without it. We have Delphis toilet cleaner (have used other eco brands; like this one most) and Bower Collective limescale cleaner (cannot recommend it enough) and just straight citric acid (bought in bulk, crystal form) which gets most things. I have also just bought hydrogen peroxide to get tea stains off white granite which works well. The staining in my sink is a combo of tea and limescale, so using limescale cleaner does the job very well. We really really don't need to be using bleach. Delphis also does a really good stain remover for laundry, while I am here. :)

I’ve tried vinegar on loads of stuff and so many people swear by it. Same with steam cleaners. I never find them effective. I can only assume that my level of “clean” is much cleaner than those who think vinegar is a magic potion. I can’t help but wonder if vinegar was a miracle potion, why are so few cleaning products vinegar based?

the eco bleach just doesn’t work, so yeah, the build up will mean her place IS filthy.

I put it round the toilet overnight, fill up the bin every so often, use it in the washing machine when I di a monthly hot wash washing machine clean, I dilute with t and use it on the floor. And I squeeze it down the sinks every so frequently often.

I am talking about an unused WC which was not flushed- a second guest WC. . This happened to me .Cleaner put bleach down as part of her routine but never flushed. Did not realise myself till damage done. I presume your bleached WC was used and flushed.

Seriously?

In 45 years of loo cleaning I've never seen bleach remove glaze.

It doesn't though remove limescale which looks like the pot that the pan is made of under the glaze.

Which part of the house does the claner say needs bleach?

We use it in the loo, alternated with other products, and for getting tea stains of the half sink. We drink a lot of tea but also let quite bit go cold in the pot and ditch it down the sink.

And yet that hasn’t happened after 15 years of cleaning the same bathroom.

Buy her a bottle. Why make her job harder?!

TRUE - if you put bleach down a toilet often without flushing (as with a cleaner ''cleaning'' an unused WC) - the bleach will actually remove the porcelain from the bowl and you are left with what is underneath the porcelain i.e. the concrete base of toilet showing through in a grey rough patch where bleach put every day.!

Do you have a young child who's likely to inhale some/ be in actual danger from it's presence OP? If so, I'd let the cleaner know, and arrange for the bleach to either be removed from your home by her when she's not cleaning (So she stores it and brings it every time), or arrange a safe, lockable place which she has a key to, so it's well out of any young children's way. Also ask that rooms are aired out after it's been used, and the toilet is flushed so it's not left sitting in it.

I'm quite surprised at the amount of people who claim not to use bleach at all to be honest - I always have and thought everyone did. What are you using on your toilets if not bleach?

I use citric acid and it kills germs.

Hmm. I've still got 7.5 litres of white vinegar left from the 10 litres I bought in 2019. It ain't all that - plus, bleach does not harm your pipework, but vinegar does if they are plastic. (Not sure about metals and cant be bothered to find out.)

Basically, bleach releases chlorine when in contact with water. What remains is salt. Vinegar is an acid and remains intact in water, it just dissolves to a weaker acid. You should never put it in your washing machine.

Bleach isn’t removing the limescale, it just removes the colour so you can’t see the limescale. You need to use something acidic or physically scrape the limescale off the porcelain.

Bleach fools you into thinking the loo is clean. It’s disinfected, but not limescale-free.

I rarely use bleach. Studied river polution as my biology dilatation but the chemicals that go down the loo isnt a issue by far. Could you compromise by saying use sparingly and rarely?

Bleach is very effective in tiny amounts. It's only dangerous to inhale when mixing as it releases chlorine gas. If its the gas that worries you look for another oxygenating bleaching agent . Chlorine like any gas disapates fast so it only kills the person doing the mixing. Hopefully the cleaner doesn't want to poison herself.