Holiday cottage clear up etiquette

[Justkeepswiimming]

I'm the last night in a holiday cottage. I've swept up and will put the dishwasher on, and will have a final wipe round tomorrow morning, sort sheets and towels into a pile, but that's the most I'll do. Is that reasonable?

I have holidayed in self catering cottages since I was small and I always remember a huge clean up effort before leaving the evening before/morning we left. Part of me resents doing too much these days. For a start I'd like to think the place is being thoroughly cleaned, so what's the point in me doing too much as it will be gone over again.

Also I feel like the checkout time moved earlier and check in moved later over Covid due to cleaning, and has never gone back. How much can you really do as well as getting up and out, before 10? And finally, even 5-10 years ago, self catering used to be the bargain holiday. That isn't the case and more, and frankly at the prices you pay, people shouldn't be expected to do too much in the way of deep cleaning. How much does everyone else do?

We own a holiday cottage.
I'm delighted if
the dishes are in the dishwasher
Towels are in a pile in the bathroom
Any major kitchen or floor mess has been swept up
No shitty toilets or toothpastey sinks
Bins taken out.
Things put back where they were (so many people like to rearrange my lounge and hide remote controls!)

Don't bed strip unless asked to and I certainly don't expect spotless or for people to be sweeping hoovering and mopping. You are on holiday and you pay a cleaning fee!

Essentially don't be the vile family (couple with newborn and a toddler) who came for a long weekend and left all the dishes from their dinner the night before and most of breakfast including jammy knives stuck to the kitchen table and a whole loaf of bread I left for them cut up and then torn up and thrown around the kitchen. Cups and glasses in every bedroom and coffee thrown up the wall. A pile of used nappies teetering on the bathroom bin. Wet towels (and 6 more from the linen cupboard) dropped on carpeted floors. Bins overflowing. Baby sick down the side of the portacot and on the duvet. Choc chip cookies ground into the carpet. Shower hose pulled off the wall. A remote control missing and the furniture rearranged with my spare linen draped over it so their toddler could have a 'den'. They also called me at 6am on Sunday to ask where the milk brother was for the Nespresso machine. (I don't have one in the cottage but I took them ours)
They left me a shitty review because of the fucking frother and because the washing machine stopped working which was hard for them with a newborn. They didn't mention it broke because they had it running 24/7 and broke it because they also threw in a load of toddler hair clips and didn't tell me it was broken.

If you aren't those arseholes then that's brilliant!

We have a holiday let don’t expect people to do any more than this

like most people i will leave the kitchen clean fridge emptied and clean floor swept and if theres a mop mopped, front room tidy, bathroom sink toilet and shower left clean but not deep cleaned, and last time we were in a holiday cottage was just after lockdown so was on instructions to put bedding and towels into a linen bag supplied and rubbish bins emptied took about half an hour but there is only two of us no pets or kids

I have holiday lets and don’t expect cleaning. If guests avoid leaving vomit in the hot tub, dog crap in the garden, leaving two hours late, pulling doors off hinges and breaking beds and furniture and appliances then I’m happy!

@TellerTuesday see this is great. The place I've just left is a 4pm check in and a 10am check out. But I stayed at a place in Cornwall in October with a 5pm check in and 10am check out which seems to be more common these days and is a real pain in the bum with kids. It's almost bedtime when you get yourself in and unpacked.

@judgementfail and @TheOnlyAletheia I feel much better about my efforts. But utterly bemused about who could do this!?

I follow any specific instructions like take bin bags outside to X spot.

I'm paying for cleaning though, so don't clean the skirting, wash the windows, scrub the bath etc, but do leave things tidy. I do wash and put away dishes, leave towels in a pile in the bathroom and sweep any crumbs up. I don't strip beds unless requested.

More people than you’d think 🙂 unfortunately! And nobody tells you that they’ve broken the bin/microwave/ bed etc so you find out when they leave and then have to sort the cleaning, laundry and replacement beds/ microwaves etc by 3.

I would not mop, might sweep if floor very bad

This

Holiday cottage cleaner here. Anything you can do to make sure that it’s clean and tidy when you leave is much appreciated. Obviously we clean it ourselves so we don’t expect you to do it perfectly but if it’s basically nice and tidy it saves us so much time.

We have also turned up at cottages like the one described above that’s been left in a disgusting state and we simply don’t always have the time to do all that work. In the summer we’re flat out all day, we only have between 10 and 4 and we could have quite a few houses to get round in that time.

We have unfortunately been in the awkward position of still being in a house when the new lot of guests turned up. All we could do was apologise but the previous house had been left in such a bad way that it took us a long time to put it right and put us behind.

Not every house will have it’s own team of cleaners, there’ll often be one team of cleaners travelling round doing several houses.

We don't stay in cottages that ask you to do any cleaning because we're paying to have a holiday not to do housework, thanks.

The other problem I'd have with staying somewhere you're expected to clean us that you've got to hope that the person before you could be bothered. I don't have that sort of faith in other people.

We stayed at a holiday cottage last year - left it with the dishwasher running, bins emptied. Or maybe we didn't empty the bins...I can't remember. We definitely emptied them according to the schedule in the info book but I don't think that was checkout day.

I swept/hoovered the kitchen floor as we have small children and they made an unreasonable mess. If it had just been adults I wouldn't have bothered.

I have two dogs, so sweeping is part of my daily (hourly) routine, so I did do sweeping as kormal. Mainly because it's disgusting otherwise!

I refuse to strip the blooming beds. It takes no time and as previous posters have said the time allowed for cleaning is so long now. Ours is also out by ten and not in until five

I would empty fridge and bins, wash and put away all dishes, wipe down kitchen surfaces and put towels in the bath as standard and sweep up any obvious mess. I only strip beds if they state I should do. Most you're paying a hefty and visible cleaning fee so I'm not cleaning, just tidying up after ourselves. I've always received very positive comments about leaving the place clean and tidy.

I used to have a job cleaning holiday rentals and what you've said sounds fine. Most people did the same. Taking out the bins was something I particularly appreciated. Them not doing the dishes was always really annoying.
Some people left them in a really disgusting state that made you shudder at the thought of their house, if they'd managed to make this amount of mess in a week. A used tampon in a cupboard was a memorable one.

I always fold the bed back after husband has made it as I once read a secrets of hotels thing where cleaners were of the view that people made the bed if they’d had a disaster with the sheets !

We have out by 10am, check in from 3pm. Which I think is very reasonable.

Often I have guests who only just start packing the car at 10am, so aren’t out until 10.45am, then the next guests turn up at 12.30pm asking for early check in. It’s virtually impossible to do a less than 2hr turn around.

It does make me tempted to move check out to 9.30am though to allow for people not actually leaving on time. But I haven’t as it then it affects those who do actually leave on time.

We follow any specific instructions, make sure all the plates etc are either washed and put away or in the dishwasher (turned on) and wipe up any spillages/crumbs etc. if a bin is filled while we're there we'll empty it rather than piling stuff around it (or if we're told to put it out on bin day). But we're just two adults and don't tend to make too much mess anyway (and usually eat out most of the time even when we're self catering).

We ask guests to wipe up any spills, strip the bed and put the dishwasher on. The cleaners go in after every guest so there’s no point in them doing more than that.

I do wish guests wouldn’t leave bloodied bedding though. It happens way too often and it’s not pleasant for the cleaners.

Sounds fine. I probably wouldn't bother sweeping unless I'd had a big hairy dog with me, they'll be sending cleaners in.

I always make sure all the crocks are clean and put away, put the towels in a pile in the bathroom and put the bins out (if there's instructions/somewhere obvious to put them)

We have stayed in the same cottage in Cornwall a few years running.
They ask for sheets and towels in the bath, bins and recycling out.
We always wash pots and wipe the kitchen sides and bathroom.
They've always greeted us with a lovely cream tea and a bottle of milk.

I used to clean chalets at butlins and rooms in a local hotel. I appreciated the above. The stories I could tell about the others...

I stopped staying in holiday cottages after the last one (soon after covid) had an early check out AND a long list of chores to do. It was a lovely house but made the last day so stressful. It’s good to hear most of the feedback from the posts on here that this isn’t the norm.