To ask if money gets tight will you cancel your cleaner??

[Tootsey11]

I am a cleaner, and with prices of everything rising, I'm wondering if or when the cancellations will start coming.

Will you prioritise a clean house and cut back on other things?

At the moment I am not short of work, but may need to increase the hourly rate for my furtherest away clients. I'm holding back as I'm worried about pricing myself out. I charge between £10 and £11/hour. There are people in my area advertising cleaning for £8/£9 an hour.

If you have a cleaner, will you keep them on or needs must and get rid

We’ve dropped our cleaner to twice a month and as much as I’d hate to lose her it is a luxury so yes, if things do take a turn for the worse we will have to let her go. Sorry!

Perhaps you could look at doing some offers to drum up additional work now so you can save a buffer? One off deep cleans, windows and PVC cleans, de cluttering services and cupboard cleans etc? Could you look at your existing clients and work out a stream lined service so if they do look reducing services you have a plan in place to offer them to try retain their business?

Good luck!

I don’t have a cleaner but I do have a window cleaner. At the moment I am paying £20 every six weeks but I am going to have to cancel soon. I have also cancelled the man who comes to clean the gutters at £50 a time. I will be getting the ladder out and doing them myself.

I'm a dog walker and have similar concerns.

Luckily most of my clients work full-time and so will always need someone to let their dogs out/walk them, but I've already lost a full-time client this year. They couldn't justify paying me five days a week - I now do two days and their adult daughters do the rest on their days off.

I suspect that will become more common, unfortunately.

As long as she didn't nearly double her prices, I would rather live without my husband than my cleaner.

My cleaner just increased her prices yesterday, to £15 p/h (she brings all equipment and products), to take effect 1 April. We're in the North East of England. She is excellent and we're keeping her on - we've had a few crappy cleaners but she is top north and I don't want to lose her if I can help it. If money got tight we'd rather sacrifice other things!

I don't currently have a cleaner and it is high on my priority list to find someone and cling on to them for dear life.

Top notch* not top north!

We don't have a cleaner but I was going to suggest what a PP has just done, and that is to try to expand on what you're offering.
Eg can you do dog walking, ironing, or cooking as an additional service to your clients.
Or, something that would be useful for older or infirm people is to accompany them to hospital appointments, run errands for them, help them with things they can't manage themselves but without being an actual carer.
We don't live near DH's elderly mother and it would be so useful to have a reliable person who could help out, otherwise it means one of us driving over ninety minutes each way.

Possibly. I’m self employed and it is more time and cost efficient to employ my cleaner than do it myself. If my work dries up though I will have to clean and let the cleaner go

No chance.

I would never let our cleaner go, she's amazing.

Cleaner would absolutely be the first to go. I’ve already cancelled window cleaner. We can’t cut much else out, and I refuse to be hungry/cold.
A cleaner is a luxury to me, as I am quite able to do it myself

I wouldn't and honestly I'd have thought most people who can afford a cleaner will be solvent enough not to be affected that much. Unless perhaps they have small children in childcare, where their income will be extra squeezed.

I wish I could afford a cleaner before all the price rises, never mind now.

We are cutting back on everything to afford our cleaner. There may come a time when we can't afford them realistically though. I think we are all hoping the predicted craziness come April somehow won't happen, but many of us are going to be a lot worse off.

No. I work freelance part time and if we start to feel the squeeze, I’ll be needing my cleaner even more if I take on extra work.

We have cancelled our gardeners though and have also put some home improvements (new wooden floors) on hold.

I found during the last couple of years, when certain trades have been in high demand (like our gardeners, who constantly cancelled, randomly turned up or moved dates), the quality of service has sometimes suffered because they took on too much work, or took clients for granted. I guess the reckoning is nigh!

@Tootsey11

I'm in Northern Ireland. £10-£12 is the standard rate here. I'm told I do a fantastic job and am offered new houses all the time. But am conscious of the fact that many will start to tighten their belts with everything going on.

I'm in rural Co Down and pay £15/HR for my independent cleaner. Wouldn't be without her!! If we have to cut back I think I will cut our personal spends, stop eating out and cut out Botox before the cleaner. Not just because a clean house makes me happy but also because I know her well and she's local so I'd feel more guilty cutting her than any of my other luxuries.

If one or both of us lost our jobs we’d have to cancel our cleaner. Other than that it’s one of my priority costs because it means I can use my time off to relax and spend time with kids. I recently did a household budget because we keep overspending because of rising costs. The cleaner was down as a ‘fixed cost’ 😆

No, my cleaner keeps my house from falling apart plus we love her and she’s great at her job.

But tbh we have space in the budget, if we didn’t I think we’d still have her as top of the list to keep. I think if you are good at your job your clients who can manage to keep your rate within budget will keep you even if its tight.

We're lucky enough to be able to afford cost rises, but we'd cut corners in many other areas before losing our cleaner (and I don't particularly like her or think she's great at her job - just good enough).

The most likely change we'd make would be switching to fortnightly - you could offer that at a reduced rate to clients you don't want to lose?

E.g. 3h fortnightly at £9.50h instead of 2h weekly at £10h?

I would rather live without my husband than my cleaner.

Our window cleaner is safe, he also clears the gutters. But a cleaner for inside would definitely go if we had one.

Husband would go before the cleaner.

Not give up as I had to give up my cleaner when we moved house during covid and it was too far for her to travel but I was going to look into getting a new cleaner when DH and I start our new jobs in April but now our pay rises will be taken up by essential bills unfortunately.

We no longer have a cleaner, around here the going rate is £17.50 an hour