To sack cleaner for this?

[Katrinawaves]

My husband and I had a mix up today and both left cash out to pay the cleaner. She has taken both lots of cash so double her normal payment for the day. Would I be unreasonable to sack her for this? My husband is saying we should just not pay her next week but I am concerned now about her honesty. What would you do?

Not reading 8 pages but just ask her about it- she might've assumed something like you'd be away next week so paying in advance now. Perhaps she's got other clients who do this.

Give her the opportunity to return it or clean next week without payment on the day.

If you're not happy after that then it's your home so you don't need to keep her, but at least give her the chance to put it right and explain why she picked up both payments.

• The money was left where the cleaner's money is left. It's not unreasonable for the cleaner to think it is her money. It is perfectly possible for the cleaner to have seen it the second time and to have not remembered she had already picked it up. The number of people here with perfect recall is incredible.*

If you read previous Posts you'll see why that is unlikely the cleaner didn't realise.
You don't get the reality of being £50 in cash - you count it, you put it in your purse:wallet where lo and behold there's another £50 oops I already took my wages this isn't my money..! If you are collecting multiple amounts from different customers you keep records. You count the money when you get home and contact to see you soon theres been a mistake

I'm pretty sure even with your 'not perfect recall ' you don't steal from shops picking up an item twice as you've already paid or walking out without paying your cafe bill.., The cleaner will have known fairly quickly that she mistakenly ahem took £50 not her money. A table is a table in OPs house, it's not fair game to steal anything off of it that's not due to her!

Someone definitely needs to speak to her about this and ask why she took two sets of money.

Sounds to me like cleaner is self employed as carrying out serves at multiple households

..... or innocent until proven guilty.

You need to go into the conversation with your cleaner on the assumption that they are innocent. This will ensure that whatever the outcome, you both come away with dignity intact.

"DH and I each left £50 for you this week, by mistake. It was a mix up on our part as we were in a rush that day. Did you see both lots of money on the table?"

note the wording "did you see ..." not "did you take...."

say the above and no more. Let your cleaner talk about the situation from their point of view.

there are many possible scenarios and outcomes:

1. Supposing your DH hadn't even left the money, maybe he thought he had, but had not. Are you 100% certain he had? What then? The reality is they were innocent of any wrong doing, but there is no proof unless of course you have the MN security CCTV camera footage, panning down on the table showing two separate piles of money From your cleaner's perspective they were completely innocent and will say "I only took the £50 you left for me". Are you going to sack them anyway because you think they're lying, but you only have your DHs word not actual proof.
2. Supposing they took the 2 x £50. But then deny it vociferously and say there was only 1 x £50 . You have no proof, you then have to decide if you believe them or not.
3. Supposing they admit wrong-doing and apologise, yes they took the 2 x £50 but state they honestly thought they had been left a bonus. Are you really going to sack that person? Even after they apologise?
4. Supposing they admit they took the money but didn't feel they did anything wrong, they thought it was a bonus. in this case, you can sack them for stealing, but at a time like this, be aware people are doing desperate things to keep the wolf from the door, you'd have to be a pretty harsh person to send them packing. Sadly when cash is left out it does put temptation in peoples way, that's life. You'd do well to learn a lesson from this and agree with your DH that only one of you should ever leave the cleaner their money so it never happens again.

You honestly think the police would be the slightest bit interested in this? They don't come out when houses are broken into? You get a crime number only.

I suggest you would be wasting OPs time, with it's a theft, call the police.

I agree the thought of this is

MN is so fucking weird about cleaners.

Totally agree.

Blimey, @Icepinkeskimo - OP hasn’t been drowning puppies!

Seconded.

Agreed!

Yanbu

but this is Mumsnet

so you’ll be roasted for the audacity of having a cleaner

Mumsnet hates people who can afford a cleaner. Same as they hate landlords and stepmums

If you are going to talk to / message the cleaner I wouldn't wait until her next visit. I can understand the trust has gone. If you are okay with her being back next week then I would be messaging now saying that it appears you and your DH both left payment out and she appears to have collected it so that will cover next week.

It could have been a mistake but that it hasn't been picked up and rectified is also an issue. I would notice that amount of extra money later even if I had picked up accidentally. Some people will actively look to do things that are wrong and others will be of the mind that this fell in to their lap and they aren't really doing anything wrong by not saying anything. Somebody posted earlier about getting double paid at work. It happened to me in a local authority and I called and informed them as soon as I knew. I had colleagues asking me why I'd done that and that I should have kept quiet and kept it. Another colleague had 2k into his bank account credited there by accident by someone else. He was asked to do something for it to go back and said no. His view was that he want a thief as he didn't take it but he wasn't going to return it.

i agree - perhaps she also forgot
but i would lose trust

Why do you not pay into her bank account? Do you not pay NI /Tax etc ? Cash in hand ? Really ?? I think this is another bullshit mumsnet "The Help Has Been Pilfering" posts that pop up every now and again to keep the Daily Fail interested.

Who normally leaves the wages for the cleaner , how come you both left it without checking with each other ?

If you wfh why do you leave cash lying out for her in the first place? Why not give it to her directly at the end when you say goodbye? I wfh too (and use a cleaner) and would feel really rude just chucking cash in a corner and not even greeting/saying goodbye to them!

We do this. It's because she doesn't come at exactly the same time every week and we have lots of meetings on teams throughout the day. So the easiest thing is to leave it out. I usually do get a chance to pop out and make her a coffee and have a quick chat but not 100% of the time.

I would love to pay by standing order but our cleaner prefers cash. I think it's because she then doesn't have to keep checking her back account to know who has and hasn't paid.

@Tiani4 maybe clean yer own muck then eh ?

Lots of posts since last night

re tax - I did not hire the cleaner, did not set the pay rate and she is able to send someone else to do the job when she is unavailable so she does not meet the criteria of an employee

I am often on a video meeting when she arrives and leaves and so not able to hand the money to her in person.

My husband usually leaves the money for her and she picks it up as she is leaving. But he can be absent minded so as I did not see it on the table, I left some out. I did text my husband to check whether he had left money for her but he was at work and did not see the text.

Contact the agency and let them deal with it. That's why you pay them so you don't have any hassle , then get yourself more organised

@Tiani4

You assume OP can afford to lose £50

Which bit of my post states or implies this?

Re. "Be kind", my point is that, whilst theft is never right, the empathetic approach would be to try to understand the situation from the cleaners perspective and see what can be done (if anything, given OPs own personal perspective etc).

If you didn't get that, you're unlikely to get it, and people like you are why the world is fucked.

To those saying the payment arrangement is odd it’s the same one I had. I paid the agency so much a month based on the number of hours per week then the cleaner x per hour. Challenge was that if the cleaner didn’t come, I still had to pay the agency the same which was based on her doing the hours every week. That irked me as I didn’t get the full ramifications of this when I signed the contract. My fault as they were transparent about it but it just seemed an odd set up. My Husband started working less hours so he does it now.

I never cease to be amazed on this site of the number of posts, supposedly from professional adults, whose staff management and communication skills disappear when it comes to dealing with cleaners and nannies.

It does make me wonder what they are like dealing with staff in their own workplaces. Do they randomly sack people without even discussing an incident or automatically assume X must be guilty because they do a particular type of job or are not one of the "family"?

Wouldn’t she see the first lot of cash in her wallet when she put the second lot in?

or get home and count her wages out and realise?

Im not sure most people capable of holding down a job are so forgetful they can’t recall picking up money a couple of hours previously.

Im not saying she was stealing but yours doesn’t seem the most likely explanation.

@Tiani4

or walking out without paying your cafe bill..

I've left restaurants and bars before without realising I hadn't paid the bill - it happens.

Of the occasions I can think of:

1. they called me about 5 minutes after I'd left and I rushed back, very embarrassed, and paid the bill
2. the day after a night out, I realised I hadn't paid a bill at a bar (lived in Europe, you pay at the end). Went back, they hadn't noticed and I had to convince them to let me pay which I did.

It happens. People make mistakes. Doesn't make them criminals