To not clean a 1 bed flat if I'm charged a £30 cleaning fee for a long weekends use

[speedyboardersuzanne]

I stayed in a one bed for a long weekend. Everything was left pretty much as I found it apart from I stripped the beds and because we were running late I didn't have time to do the breakfast pans and dishes. It did need a bit of a clean after we were gone, but no more than two hours to get it back to being perfect.

Owner is being assey with me saying I left the bedrooms in a state, kitchen dirty with dishes and the whole place dirty. Apparently I should of left it as I found it, ie cleaned. But surely as I'm being charged a cleaning fee I shouldn't need to clean?

30 would cover 4 hours of cleaning IMO, and no way did it even need half of that.

But you said you only just made the train?? Weren't you an hour early??

If they charged a £30 cleaning fee for your stay, then id have expected that you didnt actually need to clean. I think theyre taking the piss.

I usually do a basic clean and tidy of anywhere I stay, but if im actually charged extra for cleaning, then they can fucking do it.

Ive been actually put off many airbnb places because of their extortionate cleaning charges on top of rental. Ive seen places charge £15 or £20 cleaning charge on top for one nights stay.

Surely a person leaving a rental tidies by taking their stuff and going home?

That's basically my approach.

I think you probably should have cleaned the dishes, since I wouldn't consider the washing up to be part of a regular cleaners duties. The rest I would say is fine though. I think it's pretty rude and unprofessional if an owner is having a go at you afterwards for not cleaning when you left.

I would say to her that I fail to see what a £30 cleaning fee is for, if it is not to clean the place.

I'm not a good housekeeper or tidy but leaving dirty dishes and not wiping down kitchen surfaces wasn't on. I think the owner is right to be annoyed.

I would always wash up any plates/dishes, etc before leaving - or leave them in a running dishwasher.
I only strip the beds if asked to do so generally, but I will make sure the bed is made.
I leave all towels in the bathroom.
I tend to empty bins either into one large bin, or into the outside bin/recycling if available.
We pick up any obvious bits but don't vacuum or mop unless it is more than would be deemed reasonable for the time - when staying for a week, we will normally sweep/vacuum if it gets very messy.
I wipe round the bathroom sink as we go - if toothpaste is on the sink, it gets wiped, etc.

But I don't leave it spotless - I leave it tidy and so that it just needs a clean round the bathrooms/vacuum.

But I treat it as I would staying in a hotel/B&B tbh - I have often paid a reasonable amount to stay there, and its not always cheaper than a hotel. In a hotel I do not hoover, strip beds, etc. but do make it tidish.

OP has said she didn't realise her phone automatically adjusted the time & so did it manually also resulting in going back 2 hours rather than 1. So she thought it was, say, 9.30am and actually it was 10.30am.

YANBU OP. Either you pay a cleaning charge or you expect to clean a rental yourself. Not both.

£30 = 2 hours cleaning here, and 2 hours should be perfectly adequate to clean a 1 bed flat after a weekend's use.

If you're being charged a cleaning fee, then no, YANBU.

Assuming normal use for a couple of days 2 hours is plenty of time to quick clean a 1 bed flat and do the dishes (which is part of cleaning if you're tidying up a flat in my opinion - just as a hotel maid would wash or replace teacups)

I can do every room in my house in 4 hours.

Most phones change if you have them set to gmt, not just apple.
My 5 year old phone does it and it's crap.
If the clocks went back an hour how did you miss your train? Wouldn't you be early?
Besides, the clocks went forward, not backwards??
Think it Really depends how messy the place was.
I go away to a family apartment and pay a cleaning charge.
Always clean it before i leave though.
I'd expect a cleaner to go in there after every guest anyway.
I wouldn't leave the place a mess just because a cleaner was coming in though. Not a deep clean, but a clean.
£30 for 4 hours cleaning??

I agree leaving dirty dishes was manky and not acceptable. Yes you were late but that was your problem, not the owner's. You need to take responsibility for that.

The thing with dirty dishes is that depending on when a holiday rental is not booked they could be sitting there for days depending on change overs.

IMO you should leave a place as you found it but not give it a proper clean. So you do the washing up, make or strip the bests, put the rubbish out, remove any toothpaste or shaving bristles from the bathroom sinks, clean up any spillages, ensure the loo isn't skiddy, empty the fridge etc. Basically ensure that if the place was untouched for a month it wouldn't grow a bio-hazard.

I think not washing up was really poor and actually quite disrespectful. For that alone the owner is entitled to be cross, but has expressed it very unprofessionally.

We like to give holiday rentals at least a surface clean - hoovering, surfaces, loo - strip the beds and take the rubbish out. Essentials IMO are washing up and surfaces, and not leaving obvious dirt (e.g. in the loo, sand or crumbs on the floor).

You should have washed the dishes, but not made the beds or swept the floors.

Actually, for a £30 cleaning fee washing dishes is courteous, but not necessary. 2.5h is plenty for cleaning, bed stripping and dish washing for a 1-bed flat. Tidying will have happened by OP packing her clothes, bed stripping is unnecessary.

my cleaner washes dishes. Whats wrong with someone washing dishes if youve paid them £30 to clean?

I rent out a holiday let but don't charge a cleaning fee however I do ask for the place to be left clean and tidy so the cleaner's work is minimised as she's on a tight schedule. By that I mean I expect dishes to be washed and the fridge to be emptied, rubbish put in outside bins, floors swept if particularly sandy. If the place is left in a real mess then I'll take an hour's cleaning rate from the security bond but that's very rarely necessary.

People have very different interpretations of what clean means though and that's where difficulties can arise.

That's just it, Celeriac, you don't charge a cleaning fee. The owner of this place charges £30 AND wants the guest to clean, too. Maybe he repaints the walls every time or something.

I can't believe the amount of cleaning that people do after they've paid to stay in a rental property!! Do you do this when you stay in a hotel? Part of the reason I stay in hotels is to avoid cleaning! I always leave them tidy but don't clean the sink or shower!

Well I wouldn't buy a stamp then drive my letter to its destination.

Same thing really yanbu

I assume that the owner prices the rental to include the associated costs of renting, which includes cleaning, just as a hotel does. If they don't they should.

I am respectful of the properties I stay in and abide by the owners' requests, if reasonable, but I don't go on holiday to clean toilets or to vacuum floors.

How did you only just catch the train that you were an hour early for?

I'm interested about just how dirty you managed to leave it that by your own admission there was 2 hours cleaning to be done in order to get it back to standard after just a few days. It should have at least been tidy and if it was, all they should have needed to do was disinfect the kitchen sides, hoover, put new bedding on and give the bathroom a once over.

I'm going to go against the grain and say YABU. Especially so for leaving your dirty dishes for someone else to deal with.

Though IMO the landlord is being very unprofessional and should consider including the cleaning fee as part and parcel of the rental fee to avoid people deciding to not bother cleaning up after themselves.

You mentioned that you can get a cleaner for £7.50 per hour cash. But when running a rental (as a business) you shouldn't be paying the 'cash'rate, but should be paying the proper rate for someone to declare their earnings and pay tax & NIC if necessary.

If they only thing left was from dinner, why would it be there in the morning? Surely you wash dinner dishes after dinner

Maybe they were human and decided to get down to some holiday loving after dinner and a drink instead of washing the dishes.

It happens.

yanbu.