For asking the heating engineer to wear shoe covers in my house

I had my boiler serviced and the chap brought his own shoe covers.

Having walked many a school run where there are giant piles of dog shit that get worn down with rain or whatever then seeing that shit stain still marking the pavement and people just walking on it we are a shoes off household. It isn't the mud it is the germs they bring in and no wiping your feet on the mat does not remove all of it. We walk on streets that have shit and piss all over them, crushed insects, spit etc, no way is that coming beyond my door mat. I also have a large outdoor mat for shoe wiping.

My parents were a shoes off household and we wore slippers inside. Some of my flooring is hard so can be swept and mopped but my lounge is carpeted as are the stairs, landing and all bedrooms. No one is wearing shoes in this house. I give every guest a heads up about it before they come. For regular visitors they have left their spare slippers here.

Seriously? You make sure that there’s a good entrance mat in the porch to wipe your feet. Life is for living and welcoming people to my home.

At least this goes some way to explaining why some peoples carpets are full of filth and other associated rot.

Although to be fair even if you do take your shoes off carpets still get full of dust skin mud pet dander bits of food and all the tiny beasts that live off that.

Unreasonable, insulting and downright ridiculous.

If it's any consolation, I'm sure you'll have given them a good laugh when they get together. Totally crazy 😂😂

Of course not. As you say it’s a cultural thing in those places and I would suppose that everyone would do it.

My plumber started to take his shoes off when he called for a quote, I told him no need as I'm not a shoes off house. To be honest on leaving his socks would have been dirtier than his shoes on the way in 😂😂

Also Indians - I've had a number of Indian clients and they always ask you to remove shoes before going into their homes. They're not "bizarre" or "unhinged" either.

I think it’s a custom that can really vary with location. Those that practice it (taking shoes off) certainly aren’t bizarre or unhinged.

Neither are those who don’t.

It’s not okay for OP to imply that those who do things differently to her don’t like to take care of their homes or aren’t interested in having a nice home.

Also Indians - I've had a number of Indian clients and they always ask you to remove shoes before going into their homes. They're not "bizarre" or "unhinged" either. I've been in hundreds of clients' homes over the years and always ask if they want me to take my shoes off at the door. There's usually the "hint" anyway as most have a pile of various outdoor shoes in the front porch or in a rack by the door. Very few have told me to leave shoes on - many have looked visibly relieved when I've suggested it as they were clearly embarrassed to ask!

I find it amazing that some tradesmen seem so surprised and put out that their client/customer wants them to cover their boots. There's no way on Earth it's the first time they've been asked. They're just being awkward sods.

When we had a couple of new sofas delivered, the delivery men actually brought huge cover cloths to put over the hallway carpets and lounge carpets so they could leave their boots on and rightly so as lugging huge sofas really is a H&S risk without steel capped boots on and you can't be faffing around putting boot covers on when you're carrying a heavy sofa through the front door.

Any decent person would at least ask before coming into someone's house and decent tradesmen/delivery drivers will be happy to either bring their own covers/cloths or put on your shoe covers, or remove their shoes depending on what they're doing.

Very rude to ask anyone to remove their shoes, unless they are muddy.

I don't know anyone who would ask us to remove our shoes when we visit. If our shoes or boots are obviously dirty then we would clean them and put them back on.

I don't get "shoes off at the door!" So very rude and unwelcoming.

People had nice clean homes before the shoes off fad began. My parents’ house was immaculate and my mum would have thought you were insane.

I disagree.

How can a home be nice & clean if people walk through it with outdoor shoes that have collected everything from mud, dog poo, grit, germs to leaves? You’d have to constantly hoover and/or wipe the floors?

I don't believe for a moment this happened 😅 ..... gave you a strange look 😅 I don't believe you

In many cultures it is not normal to wear shoes indoors e.g. Japan, India, Malaysia, Sweden etc …

A host in Japan would provide slippers at least.

@FunkyFringe Are all these people “bizarre” and “unhinged” ?

Irish here.

I agree. I'm 43 and I only know of one household I've ever been in that's shoes off and that's my best friends house but she grew up in Canada and she said almost every household was shoes off.

Even homes that are immaculate have been shoes on.

I'm always amazed at these shoes on/off threads because I wondered where all these shoes off houses were. So I'm glad you popped up!

I do actually think shoes off is a good idea but it never took off in our house, everyone (including me) kept forgetting to take them off.

I have never, ever met a trademan or contractor who brought shoe covers or removed their shoes on entering my house. I think this is a custom that is very location dependent!
ETA I’m in Ireland @Evaka.

Clean floors don’t make a nice home. What’s really bizarre is the concept of a ‘shoe off household’.

I’m not posh or upper class, but I definitely think it’s rude, bordering on unhinged, to ask people to take off their shoes. I honestly didn’t know that it was a thing with some people as I’ve never ever come across this in my life. Nobody in my family, friends or acquaintances have this ‘rule’. Muddy shoes, ok, but definitely not everyday shoes. If someone asked me to remove my shoes, I would turn around and leave.

Tradesmen won’t and shouldn’t take their boots off because it’s a health and safety hazard. Depending what client they work for, if it’s a council or housing association and someone came and did an inspection and they had their shoes off, they’d get in trouble. DH is a trade and he always has shoe covers in the van and wears them. I’m surprised your man was surprised about it, he should be offering when he goes into anyone’s house, if you’re not bothered then fair enough.

Interesting mix of responses. Glad I'm not the only person who's not bothered. No judgement on anyone's choices but I defo dont think it's dirty to wear shoes indoors. They'll mostly have been on a pavement or inside a vehicle.

I'm Irish too. People from different cultural backgrounds have different ideas. I have been asked to take off my shoes once in 60 years. That was when my friend was in a house that came furnished with ridiculously impractical floor coverings (not of their own choosing).

I always understood that it was rude to change into slippers in someone else's house -not that I could be arsed with etiquette for the sake of it.

Most tradesmen now bring shoe covers or remove shoes. I can’t remember anytime in the last maybe 15 years when that hasn’t happened? That said, unless they have really muddy boots, I wouldn’t ask them. And I wouldn’t ever ask a guest to remove shoes, again unless they were obviously filthy. Which has never happened.
I wouldn’t choose floors, particularly in entrance areas, that I couldn’t easily clean.

Maybe she's upper class and has staff to clean up any mud.

Two guys delivered our new mattress to our bedroom this afternoon. Not a shoe cover in sight.

Me too, in fact I've had a plumber round today, never dreamt to ask him to take his boots off.
We have laminate downstairs, guess what, I mopped it after he'd gone 😯, sorted