Cleaners increase in hourly rate

[user1478790138]

Hello

First thread here so pls be gentle.

We have a largeish house in the Nottinghamshire, 6 BR, 4 BA and a fairly large ground floor, 2 children and dogs. Have had a pair of cleaners who come twice a week (initially three times but then it was to hectic for us) for several months now and paid £12ph, they want to increase it to 13.5 now. They do the cleaning and tidying, of which there is a fair amount but I don’t limit them time wise. Not sure now how to react, we’ve had them since March, somehow an increase of 100+ quid a month seems a bit steep in such a short period of time? What would you do??
Thank you

@Murdoch1949

The Queen has just advertised a housekeeper job at £10.90 p.h. in central London. Just to give perspective to those suggesting £15. Obviously supply & demand in your own area plays a part, and people may prefer the kudos of cleaning her Majesty's sanitary ware.

From what I gather wages are pretty crap with the Queen, she relies on folk doing it for the kudos.

I agree snog. But they are greedy and happy to exploit people.

Lots of services are increasing their prices just now in line with an increase in food prices etc. If it's too much, get a new cleaner or ask them to work fewer hours and, say, leave the bedrooms.

I just did a double take when reading this!

We have recently been in the same situation - similar sized house etc but in the SE and we do tidy for the cleaner. We were paying £13.50 ph, our cleaner wanted to increase this to £16 ph.

Historically she has increased her fee by £1 ph each time, almost 20% in one go did seem quite a hike. Having asked around and looked at job advertisments it was apparant that we were already paying the high end of market rate even without the rise.

Work out what the market rate is and take it from there. I am surprised the rate is being increased so soon, ive always found rates to increase annually.

If they are good at what they do then agree but tell them you can't agree another rise in the next 12 months without reducing their hours as you haven't had a pay rise yourself but you recognise their good work and the increasing cost of living so happy to agree now.

I'm not sure that many mumsnetters (other than the Queen obviously) can relate to the problems of people who use 20 hours a week of bought in cleaning services. Do you not have a PA to deal with this? I say this gently of course.

If you keep on top if the tidying then they get to focus on actually cleaning, could you add in a daily wipe down & tidy routine so it's easier to keep on top of? I do think they were on the very low end of the wage scale for cleaners. I did chuckle at describing a 6 bed 4 bed house as 'largish' though. It's enormous

In relation to my previous comment about wages, I have been a school cleaner and of course that was minimum wage, maximum surface amount with a very large surface area to cover (awesome job though, I can probably deep clean a 3 bed semi in 7 minutes now ). I do think that people who clean homes generally get paid more than those who clean a business/ school.

I think the cleaners are being unreasonable. Is there a term for cleaner gold diggers?
On the other hand, if you were under paying you would need to know about that too.
It's about a balance. If you're a good reliable, fair employer, I'd start investigating other options.

Do you trust them and are you satisfied with their work? Have they ever broken anything?

If your answers are a yes and a no, accept their increase.

I think that is more than reasonable, cleaners where I live are £20.00 an hour and that’s if you can get one.

@AJJR

I think the cleaners are being unreasonable. Is there a term for cleaner gold diggers? On the other hand, if you were under paying you would need to know about that too. It's about a balance. If you're a good reliable, fair employer, I'd start investigating other options.

If you offer a service and market forces mean you can charge a premium why on earth wouldn't you?

That’s really cheap for a cleaner. I’d advise staying with them or you may lose them in the long run.

@Gunpowder

This thread is very sanctimonious. How dare OP pay people to tidy for her

mikulkin I think cleaners wages are typically lower in London than elsewhere in the country. Maybe because it’s so well served by cheap public transport? And there’s traditionally a larger labour pool (presumably now greatly depleted by Brexit etc.)

That makes sense @Gunpowder. I am so used to everything else being more expensive in London that automatically assumed it will be the same with cleaners’ wages. And I love your point about tidying up 🙂 This thread is really telling me I was very lucky with my cleaners. I don’t think I ever agreed with a cleaner in advance that she should tidy up or change beds - I just showed her on the first day what is required and where to put what, assuming it is normal to ask for that. To my defence I have never had a cleaner who said she is not planning to do it or will charge me more.

We pay £12 per hour and I think it’s too cheap for my amazing cleaner. She hasn’t asked for a ride but I’m going to give her one

@DGFB

We pay £12 per hour and I think it’s too cheap for my amazing cleaner. She hasn’t asked for a ride but I’m going to give her one

That's brilliant. Amazing cleaners are like gold dust.

£15 an hour average here too and thats just for cleaning and not tidying. Think you had it cheap for the past few months but if you can afford the increase and your cleaners do a good job then keep them

I pay our cleaner £15 an hour. She comes 2 hours a fortnight. Uses her own supplies. She doesn't tidy away our things, nor would I expect her to.
We are in the West Midlands.
I'm glad you're now realising you're getting a good deal even after the price increase.

Is that £270 per cleaner per 20 hrs. Do they each do 20 hours or 20 hours each. Whatever, if the latter, £540 per week seems a ton of money to have someone clean your home. Don't you do ANYTHING yourself?
I had 5 children and a 6 bed house with en-suites plus the large living spaces you would expect in a house of that size but I did it all myself. Nobody could do it better than I could.

Gosh, I think that’s really reasonable. I pay my cleaner £18 per hour to clean my holiday let but I expect her to do it in 3 hours. I don’t ask her to clean my house because it’s always a bomb site with 3 messy kids and a dog! I wouldn’t expect her to have to tidy so until I can get on top of the tidying (need to have a massive clear out and finish off some building work), then I’ll do my own cleaning.

Correction: Is it 20 hours each or 10 hours each?

Mine are £15ph and quite frankly they are crap. They’re British. Lazy, grumpy, bad in general cleaning. My last cleaners were Polish and better. It’s hard to find anyone decent. Yay Brexit. 🤡🤡🤡

If you offer a service and market forces mean you can charge a premium why on earth wouldn't you?

Yes, those same market forces mean you may price yourself out of the market if you are not careful.

Stop blowing your own trumpet and peddling cleaners services Selfemployed

Yay Brexit

Remoaner detected

Wow that's so cheap!! Cleaners are between around £15/16 ph for an independent cleaner or £20-£30 ph for a company round here.

You should pay it and just hope that they don't realise they're badly underpricing it and reset prices again to what it should be to make an ok living as self employed people.