To say cleaning is hard work?

[Iwantafuckingbreak]

I'm a cleaner, I work for myself and I've just finished for the day. I only worked 8-3.30 today but I am dead! I didnt have time for a break and only about 10 minutes of that was travel time. Lugging around hetty, up and down stairs and cleaning houses with a million bathrooms. My knee is buggered, my back hurts like hell and I'm just knackered. But I still get people make comments about how it's only cleaning or get clients with ridiculously unrealistic expectations.

I had one lady who only had me once because I said it was impossible to clean her 4 bed house top to bottom in 1 hour a week. I only agreed to go for 1 hour because she said she only wanted her floors doing because she had a bad back, my normal minimum is 2. When I got there she gave me a massive list to complete in 1 hour and then got arsey when I couldnt do it all.

Luckily the majority of my clients are lovely and I understand if they did their own cleaning I would have no work! But some people only have me 2 hours a fortnight or something like that and dont lift a finger between visits. Sometimes this is ok but one lady didnt even hoover.. or anything for that matter in 4 months during lockdown. It took me pretty much 4 hours just to Hoover her house when I came back! (It is a big house to be fair) but come on!

Obviously it goes without saying I am grateful for the work ... especially since my partner was made redundant. I also hope to grow my business in the long run but right now I'm slogging my guts out everyday and the "but it's only cleaning" comments piss me off! Along with clients who have no idea how long it takes to clean things properly!

I've always wondered why I'm not a size 6 with all the cleaning I do ! It is knackering and seems to work every muscle in the body

Hi OP,
I went to buy a TV once in my small local independent shop. I said “ Hi I’m looking for a TV - do you have anything cheap and cheerful”. I was told kindly but firmly “We don’t do cheap and cheerful as we get the phone calls when they brake - we do fairly priced quality Tvs...” I bought the TV.

You need to adopt some of that attitude - portray it to your clients and believe it yourself. “I can’t clean your whole house in 2 because I only clean PROPERLY and it wouldn’t be done to my standards. I can clean the whole house in four hours or we can agree I do PART of your house each visit on a rota system. If you want someone to do a quick rush through and aren’t bothered about the standard then we won’t be a good match. What do you think?”

and don’t underprice yourself Client:“I am looking for a cheap cleaner” you: “I am not a cheap cleaner - I am a good/experienced cleaner at a fair price”. People like a premium product e.g. recommending to a friend “Our cleaner is not cheap but she is worth every penny”. Don’t run yourself ragged giving people more than their moneys worth.

YADNBU

My cleaner is my lifesaver. Honestly, she’s the best. Nothing beats coming home after a full week of work to find the house smelling nice and looking amazing.

Honestly, I’m so grateful to you, her and everyone else who does this job.

Not the point of thread but don’t know how you can use one of those back breaking Hetty hoovers and they’re crap anyway!!

YANBU

I admire cleaners (and bin men too. And people who manage the sewer system)
Very grateful for their services.
It's not pleasant jobs, and they keep the world running.

OchonAgus-

If I had a cleaner, I wouldn’t expect them to open the bins anyway.

But, provided it’s bagged or wrapped I don’t see what the big deal is about putting san pro in a bedroom or bathroom bin. Your daughter was probably embarrassed to carry it through the house to the outside bins.

I had a flat mate once who got angry at me for putting (wrapped, bagged) san pro in a lidded bathroom bin. I mean, who actually looks through the bins when they empty them anyway??!

I would just put gloves on and take the bin liner out, seal it, put outside and put new one in. I honestly don’t care what people put in the bin!

Interesting thread. I have mobility issues, inject biologic, take 14 prescribed tablets a day for antiflammatories and painkillers and work part-time as a cleaner because I use it as physiotherapy and my exercise regime.

Sadly I received a text recently from a client who is still working full-time with her husband who for the 3rd time now has told me they’re enjoying saving the money they’ve now got by choosing not to have me back since lockdown started....but that as I’m only PART-TIME CLEANING, it must just be a hobby for me I didn’t warrant it with a response.

I hear you, OP.

I think that you need the right ‘fit’ with a cleaner.

I’ve had good, less good and one awful.

My current cleaner is wonderful because the ‘fit’ works.

I’m not looking for the cleanest sparkly house, I want her to do what needs doing but be flexible.

Sometimes my kids are sick and take over the living room so she’ll leave there but do extra stuff upstair like ironing, or she’ll organise cupboards, empty the fridge etc. One day I’d done quite a lot of cleaning in the week so she weeded the front garden.

She’s like gold dust.

Definitely hard work. If it were easy, everyone would be happy to do their own cleaning!

It's exhausting and unpleasant enough cleaning my own home, and I can only imagine doing it for others is even more difficult.

Omg yanbu! If you do it properly, it's a workout. I know this because my cleaner used to turn up in gym kit. And when I started having a cleaner as work and kids and commuting made my life impossible to fit cleaning in, I put on over a stone.

Really hard work. I often feel sweaty and exhorted after cleaning my own bathroom, and I'm reasonably fit.

I used to have a wonderful cleaner, really miss her! (Can't afford one at the moment). We just let her get on with whatever needed doing, but she got through an amazing amount, I'm always so impressed with good cleaners. I wonder if there's a checklist somewhere or the Mumsnet hive mind could create that you could present to a new client listing the options and times, as a guide for the people who think it shoil happen in a ridiculously short time. Something like:

• Kitchen: vacuum and mop floor, clean work surfaces, clean hob: 30 minutes

-Sitting room: vacuum floor and sofa cushions. Dust all surfaces, wipe skirting boards, remove cobwebs. 20 minutes (small/ without ornaments)-30 minutes (large/with ornaments) . Charges for tidying in addition to cleaning: etc Of course the drawback might be a client with an eye on the clock telling you that it only took you 28 minutes not 30.

Yanbu!
Somehow I’ve got myself in for school and office cleaning plus others. Absolutely knackered and I’m used to it! But think positive - good cleaners don’t need gyms, and we get paid for our workout.

YADNBU, I've done a proper clean of my room today. I stripped the bed and lugged the hoover upstairs to hoover the bedroom/under the bed, behind everything etc. mopped and remade the bed. I was sweaty and knackered and think I've pulled a muscle in my back

@WitchesGlove - But, provided it’s bagged or wrapped I don’t see what the big deal is about putting san pro in a bedroom or bathroom bin.

I agree, bagged and wrapped is fine.

Your daughter was probably embarrassed to carry it through the house to the outside bins.

Nope. Lazy sod of a teenager who couldn't be arsed. She doesn't do embarrassment over things like that, which I do think is great.

Not the point of thread but don’t know how you can use one of those back breaking Hetty hoovers and they’re crap anyway!!

I've long wondered why all professional cleaners use Henry hoovers, are they actually good? Surely they aren't as good as Dysons etc?

@Jimdandy I've used all sorts of hoovers and hetty was the only one that didnt get clogged with hair and crap. I used a clients new "anti hair wrap" shark and surprise within 10 minutes it had hair wrapped round the bar.

@Iwantafuckingbreak ooh cross post! Interesting. The Dysons do get hair clogged in them, that's true.

@kiwiblue I dont really rate Dyson's all that much. Where I do so much hoovering I need something that doesn't get clogged up and stop working half way through. Never had any issues with hetty whereas always have issues with dyson and sharks.

Agree! I had a cleaning business too. I closed it when I had my DS and honestly, there's no way I'd go back to it now. I was so busy, it was non stop and I had an old back injury that was constantly aggravated. The money was great (I live in an "affluent" area, people were happy to pay my prices) but it really wasn't worth the pain.

Interesting. I know they don’t get hair wrapped around by virtue of the fact. They don’t have the rotating bar thing to get hair clogged up, but they don’t barely pick anything up!

I feel your pain OP. I'm a cleaner too and I just can't do it anymore. I don't do much domestic cleaning since Covid-19 put paid to it. However I do a lot of end of tenancy work a lot is in the newer type apartment blocks. Many of these blocks don't have parking so I have to lug Hetty, mop and bucket, bag of cloths and a bag of products what feel like miles, then try and get through the fire doors and into the flat.
Once I'm there its heavy duty scrubbing over every inch plus moving all the furniture. I enjoy what I do and seeing the end results but I'm knackered and creaky and can't face doing it for much longer.
I'm really fortunate to be retraining and I have been secured a wfh job so will be hanging up my duster for good soon.

If it was as easy as some people make out, they wouldn’t be hiring cleaners they’d be doing it themselves wouldn’t they!

This ^
Naturally, when we can afford it, we outsource jobs that we don't like doing ourselves.

I think @Merryoldgoat at 20:49 this evening has it spot on though.
You get some very indignant people on some of these cleaning threads insisting that my cleaner couldn't possibly do everything she does in the time she does it despite the fact that I see her do this each week but I want her to do what I would otherwise do each week, which doesn't involve moving the furniture, cleaning the skirting boards, cleaning the windows, or any of the other trillion jobs that I've never done on a weekly basis in all my adult life without a cleaner. I'm happy to do the 'big jobs', or 'occasional jobs' on an irregular basis as I've always done. For me I want to know all the crucial things have been done each week, then - like MerryOldGoat's cleaner, she will do 'occasional' jobs for me, as and when I ask.

I parted ways with my previous cleaner as she wanted to spend 90mins plus just in my kitchen each week and never put the vacuum round the rest of the house nor got to the bathrooms. My kitchen really, really wasn't some kind of health hazard either.

YANBU. I don't find cleaning my own place hard work, as I do a little and often and keep on top of it. But that only takes me a couple of hours a week, cleaning for 40+ hours a week would knacker my back, especially cleaning someone's house who left dirty nappies strewn about .

YANBU. DS has a summer holiday cleaning job which I'm helping him with - I did 3 hours today and was knackered. A friend of mine is a full-time domestic cleaner and I don't know how she does it especially as she's had a lot of health problems recently.