To think £85 a week is extortionate

[Pollypanda]

For a cleaner.

My house is not large, it’s a new build 4 bed with 2 bathrooms and a downstairs loo. We would only need 2 of the bedrooms cleaned as the others are largely unused.

I have been quoted £85 a week for a basic house clean (2 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, kitchen, living room and stairs)

AIBU to think this is obscenely high? I was expecting about 40-50.

For context I live in the south, but not London or the south east.

When I moved house I used MM for a Deep Clean. I paid around that. 2 women turned up and blitzed the place. They were here for a good 4 hours. They were great and it was worth it. I would pay that for a normal weekly clean though.

I now use a different agency. I pay £75 per quarter, then a further £9 per hour.

(I'm in the South East).

When we got our cleaner about 5 years ago we got a quote from Molly Maid for about £75 for a largish 3 bed. They were asking twice what the other (small local) agency did. We went with the local agency. I wasn't paying extra for their fancy uniforms.

The local agency do our (now) 4 bed, 3 bathroom, utility, dining, kitchen, sitting room, playroom for £45 which is 4 hours work (2 of them going like the clappers for 2 hours), they dust and hoover, clean all the bathrooms and the kitchen, wash and dry dishes if any left out, change and wash sheets every week, plus clean my fridge, wash windows etc as requested.

I like using a small agency, I have a regular cleaner but if there's holidays one of the two cleaners still 'knows' the house. And the cleaners have guaranteed hours (not zero contract) which I also like.

dubmum is your cleaner doing deep cleans in a different zone each time, pulling furniture out each time, oven and inside fridge etc?

That's outrageous - we have a four bed, four bath in the South East and we pay £42 a week for three hrs! If you're willing to pay £85.00 I'll come and do it!!

Try getting a quote from Fantastic Services i find them really good. I have 4 hours every other week, £12 ph outer London.

It depends on what sort of clean. £85 is good for 8 hours of cleaning, so 2 cleaners for four hours each. That is about the number of hours needed to properly clean a family home IMO.

2-3 hours a week or every other week just isn't enough to do a proper clean IMO. I also expect a clean to include cleaning windows (mine can be cleaned from the inside), oven, fridge, under furniture etc.

Def get a second and third quote because the agency should give you the number of hours.

Wow, I'm looking at how much I need to ask dh for cleaning now.
I'm not brilliant though and do about 2 hours a day at most, so at £9 ph and a day off that's £108 pw.

I pay £12 per hour to a small local company. I've had larger MM-style people before and found that they charge a huge amount and I got different people nearly every time so they never knew their way around. Not to mention the amount of people with access to my key!

I did ask MM to quote but they were just ridiculous.

Ask around locally for recommendations for small providers ismy advice

Molly maids quoted me £108 every other week...over £200 a month for cleaning  plus they then charge an additional £145 for an initial clean.....I laughed when she told me the price and have t heard from her since....
2 hours later a lady quoted me £13.50 per hour, £80 a month, signed her up on the spot and she starts next week!

The company say they don’t work to hours

Don't touch them with a bargepole. Sounds a bit scammy TBH

If you don't want to pay a hardworking cleaner to scrub your muck then do it yourself surely? if you really need to have one, you need to pay the going rate. That's someone elses salary.

Whoah that sounds a lot. DD pays £20 for 2 hours. Local person does it and works at incredible speed. She does kitchen, 2 bathrooms, one loo, 4 bedrooms and 2 receptions plus hall, landings and 2 sets of stairs. Looks fab when she’s finished. They’re in the SE. That sounds ridiculously cheap but yours sounds ridiculously expensive.

For context OP my house is exactly the same as yours and we pay £60 for a four hour clean every 2 weeks.

If you don't want to pay a hardworking cleaner to scrub your muck then do it yourself surely?

It's not the going rate though is it.

I pay £100 for about 7 hours of cleaning a week in London.

I'd cut out the agency and find an independent cleaner.

And ours is a deep clean OP - they don't do things like washing or our dishes but the non-everyday stuff I can't be arsed don't have time to do like skirting boards and the showers.

Wow thank you everyone! This has been a real eye opener. Appreciate all the advice and feedback.

@Hissstory happy hump day x

You too pollypanda!

I pay £15 an hour, could get cheaper but I pay my cleaner direct (not an agency) and I believe in fair wages. I don't have the bedrooms cleaned so it is 2 hours per week

Wow, that was my rent in 2014

I’m in the South East. 2 bedrooms, 1 playroom, kitchen, utility, bathroom, downstairs toilet, lounge and hall. She does a fantastic job. Rotates bigger jobs like cleaning all windows, pulling furniture our week by week.

She comes once a week for 2.5 hours, costs £31.50.

For context Molly maids quoted £65 for my house (midlands so hardly high cost of living)

Was it Molly Maid? I remember getting an outrageously high quote from them years ago. I hate it when they try to refuse to give a time because I bet their employees are given a time limit. Also, it will never be perfect so the argument that it "takes as long as it takes" is crap.

I live in London, in a bigger house than that and don't pay close to that.

Tell them to sod off!