Hello! I know this is an now an oldish thread but I just wanted to add that I have a professional cleaning service and it is a given within the industry that you would not be able to pay staff the legal minimum wage and stay viable as a business unless you are charging at least £12 per hour. When you go on to hit the VAT threshold you will need to then be charging at least £15 per hour but you cant suddenly put prices up so this needs consideration from the start up of you business. Pricing is crucial as to whether you will survive in the long-term as a viable business, too cheap and you will go under at some point.
I will not repeat all the costs of doing the business as most have already been pointed out but my point is that anyone going into this as a quality professional cleaning service (of which there is a known shortage!) and not just for some illegal under the table pocket money, will need to think through their pricing right from the start and stand firm with their price - it cannot be negotiable or you will fail in the long-run. Too cheap and you will either end up working for free or even worse PAYING for someone else's cleaning if staff are involved.
Also it is not legal to hire under the table cleaners it is illegal for both parties to evade tax and not declare the income. If the IR got wind of it then YOU could be classed as their employer and then any tax you should have been submitting to the IR will be back-dated at YOUR liability not the cleaner's. Hiring an unregistered person can be considered a criminal activity but not many seem aware of this. Cheap can be very expensive in the long run.
If the unprofessional cash in hand 'cleaner' were to have an accident in your home they will not be covered with the necessary insurance and could hold YOU personally liable, they will also not be covered if they break the materials of you home or burn your house down or cause a flood! As I said cheap can turn out to be very expensive.
With a professional company you pay more for this protection and to (hopefully) receive service from fully trained cleaners who know about the basic chemistry of the products they are using and can care for you home appropriately. We have cleaned homes where a £10/hr 'cleaning lady' has been the previous service and the materials of the home have been ruined, even with our care we can only restore a small part of these damages.
I am saying this just to make you aware - there are good and bad services out there but for your own sakes and the sakes of those running professional cleaning services (which is very hard work whether out in the field or just taking care of business!) PLEASE take care to hire a professional service who is responsible for the employment, insurance and training of the staff - not you. Make sure it is THEIR liablility if anything should occur not YOURS.
This is so very important and the reason that genuine professional services are always booked up and expanding even though they do need to charge what they do.