Would this annoy you if a cleaner did this?

[Movinghouseatlast]

I have a fairly new cleaner.

I work at home and every single time I come into the house to get something she is sitting at the kitchen table eating a sandwich or a packet of crisps or drinking coffee. She continues to sit there while I go up to where I store my equipment and come back with it- so 15 minutes twice today.

She does 4 hours and I ask her to do the kitchen, dining room, sitting room, hallway and two bathrooms. Previous cleaners have taken 4 hours to do this.

I have said to her that if she has extra time when she's finished she can do the porch or one of the bedrooms but she never 'has time'.

I think she is being really disrespectful by sitting eating and on her phone but maybe I'm wrong? We've all skived at work at some point but she's being a bit blatant about it. She does clean the rooms I've asked her to do though though often misses bits and I have to tell her the next time.

I also don't want to lose her as cleaners are very difficult to find in my area. But I feel she's walking all over me!

Wow. I charge £40 for 3 hours. Might grab a coffee and drink it as I work.. Have never sat down at anyone's house...

I pay £60 for three hours and throw in biccies and a hotel chocolat hot chocolate! Is what you charge the going rate for your area?

I wouldn’t say that for a plumber or a decorator….but I wouldn’t ever employ them on an hourly basis ……,recipe for disaster

I’m NW and minimum I have heard of is 15 quid an hour ….mostly 17 and 18 ….you selling yourself short there

@Movinghouseatlast £100 for 3 and a half hours work. Just no. I think it’s hard work and should be paid well, but blimey. That’s more than junior doctors get a hour.

No, the person who quoted £35 an hour didn't get taken on as I thought it was nuts. She did a brilliant job but £35 an hour is too much.

Reading with interest, as I'm in the process of finding a cleaner. I've been doing a lot of research online and asking people I know who've had or still have cleaners what it is I can expect.

I would have no problem with a cleaner sitting down for a break at the table, so long as they'd asked first if I minded, in the same way I'd expect anyone who was visiting for business reasons would ask if they could use any of my facilities.

One thing I've become aware of since asking about cleaners is that some people and / or companies charge for the job and not the time, so a task list is agreed (likewise an expectation from both sides of the end result) and then it's up to the cleaner to do it - breaks or no breaks.

From what I can ascertain, some people have good and bad experiences from both ways of charging, for example a neighbour of mine told me of one cleaning company who she hired who charged for the job, but were in & out like the S.A.S. She said it was very difficult to complain, as she couldn't say that more time was needed to do a better job, because she was not paying for their time, and in practice they did everything on the task list...albeit to a standard lower than she hoped for, given how much she was paying.

Her current cleaner has been with her for almost seven years now. She tells me the cleaner also charges per job, and I don't doubt she takes breaks either, as I've seen her standing in the kitchen with a cup of coffee when I've visited. The point it, my neighbour thinks she's sent from heaven, and loves it when the cleaner has been (she goes once every two weeks). Neighbour says that if she sees anything her cleaner hasn't done (and it's minor things, not whole rooms) she has every confidence it will be attended to on the next cleaning day...or else she'll do it herself.

I will say though that if I was given an hourly rate by my cleaner, I'd expect breaks to be added to that time, after all, they are selling me their time, not an end result, and it's their choice (I assume) how to charge me.

Cleaner here

I price ‘per job’ not hourly so I’m not eating into clients paid time if I take a phone call or need a break. It just means I’m there longer for the same money!

That said, unless it’s a very hot day, I only take breaks on my full day cleans which are 5-7 hours and I always leave the property for 20-30 minutes to have a proper break and certainly never eat in the clients house or make a hot drink there!

For me a deep clean is, well, everything. Usually those kinds of jobs that don't need doing every week, but leave them more than a couple of months and it becomes grime, not dirt.

Four hours for a few downstairs rooms (I assume from the list) is definitely more than a general surfaces clean.

@PlayDadiFreyr

hoe did you get 'just downstairs' out of that? Unless it's a single level house it's unlikely to have the bedrooms & bathrooms as well as the living area downstairs?!

Is it? It does sound similar to a recent thread.

OP said She does 4 hours and I ask her to do the kitchen, dining room, sitting room, hallway and two bathrooms.

That's usually mostly downstairs in most houses.

I don't think I've been to any houses with two bathrooms downstairs, so it wouldn't be "most" for me.

If you don’t want to change cleaner, perhaps tell her that her meal break needs to be when she arrives and before the 4 hours starts

A quick break for a drink during the work hours is one thing. Sitting down for lunch is too much

I said "mostly", and it's not really the point, is it? The point is that it's half a typical house in four hours, no bedrooms.

it's not really the point, is it?

Well I think it is, so asking me "is it?" won't make me agree with you.

No, the point the other poster was asking you about was how you extracted "downstairs" from the OP. It was a reasonable request. You then said the rooms mentioned were "mostly" downstairs in "most" homes. Yes, I am being pedantic, but only because you're steering the subject away from what you originally said - you were only being asked to quantify how you got to the idea that the rooms were downstairs. The person who asked about it was being ever so polite.

lol I live in the midlands and we had a cleaner come to quote last week, she told us she charged £400 a month for a weekly clean in our (very small, in her own admission not much work, no pets or kids) house - max a 2 hour clean per week.

We said we'd take the £115 deep clean she mentioned (not planning anything after that because of the ridiculous pricing), and she said if we were only doing that it would be £200 😂

4 hours is far too long for that unless the rooms are absolutely massive or you have 7 kids or run a kennels from home or something.

But yes she's taking the pee.

I'm a cleaner. I don't sit down for a coffee or lunch. I usually make one when cleaning the kitchen and drink it whilst working.
Although I do have one client who makes us both a drink and we sit and have a chat but I arrive 10 minutes early to make sure I do the full hours she's paying me for.
If your cleaner takes her breaks then she should add the 20 mins on at the end.

My cleaner will stop for a drink that's about it *unless he gets into a long conversation with me - I try and go out when he's here. Nice chap and I do like talking to him, but I also want him to clean.

Mine does a kitchen, living room, hallway and landing and two bathrooms in 2 hours, and they're done well.

Mug her off, she's shit.

Hah, I was once a lodger in a wealthy persons house in north London. One day I came home and the cleaner was drinking a magners in the back garden in the sun. It made me really happy. I'd have joined her if I didn't think I'd be ruining her peace and quiet. My partner would love to get a cleaner as we both work very long hours. But I'm a weirdo and can't stand the idea of someone I don't know in my house moving around my things. Not because of trust, just... I'm a weirdo. I collect rocks and whatever and have a million little projects on the go everywhere. It'd be like inviting someone inside my head. My poor OH though.. our surfaces do get dusty :/

Sorry that was waffling. If I was paying someone for four hours of work I agree with the others who've said 15 min tea break is max reasonable. I hate feeling walked over.

It'd be like inviting someone inside my head.

@shiverm, no, I understand that too. Our homes are very intimate spaces.

Decorators and plumbers don't usually charge by the hour like cleaners do.
She should take her break either before or after.
If she was an employee, she would have work 6 hours to be entitled to a break