To think holiday cottage company is taking the p**s

[HettyMeg]

We don't stay in holiday cottages very often so I don't know if we are a bit out of touch. But the one we're staying in has got a list as long as your arm of things we need to do before check out, including strip the beds and place all bedding and towels in a bag for laundry. It also says categorically do not put glass bottles in the bin, but there is no recycling for glass or information about where to recycle so we just need to take them home with us. If you get makeup on a towel you will be made to pay for a new one, which seems OTT to me as they can surely wash out a bit of foundation?!

Most of those are standard in other countries - recently stayed in France, Netherlands and Denmark and was expected to make the beds on arrival as well as strip them on departure.

One place asked that dirty crockery be put in the dishwasher and the dishwasher switched on. I liked this, and didn't mind the flip side that the arrival instructions stated some crockery might be in the dishwasher not the cupboards!

Re. the bottles, if they're not to be left in the bin I'd just leave them on the floor next to it! Several hotel chains explicitly ask for this, so I don't think they can complain....

I expect it's more all the stuff from the previous day plus a few cereal bowls!

I've started to prefer either hotels or posh camping - either do nothing or have a cheap break where I do it all.

Same here. I don't mind doing a big clean if I've house-sat for a friend and they've done me a massive favor and given me a free holiday. I don't mind paying hotel fees because I'm expected to do next to nothing and I'm paying for that priviledge. I don't want to pay huge fees and essentially perform a cleaner role for a holiday cottage owner. British holiday cottage owners really do take the piss, which is why I don't use them (well, that and the questionable ethics of their effects on local housing markets).

It is quite standard but it is also annoying when you have paid a lot to stay there.

Apart from the dishwasher one I honestly don’t think any of the other requests are unreasonable. Make up can be a nightmare to get off towels and bedding and they’ve probably had to throw away plenty. Why would you throw glass in the bin! I wouldn’t do that at home, just leave it in a bag by the bin.

Just put the bottles in a separate bin bag and leave it next to the bin.

Surely cleaners clean several properties, they wouldn't keep a whole day clear just for one house.

Why can’t you just do a quick wash in the sink? It takes 5 mins to wash breakfast stuff.

the cleaners do all day between me checking out before 10am and the next guest arriving after 4pm.

I'm guessing that they are actually only in there for a short period of that time, as they are paid by the hour! Also, cleaners have to charge a rate that takes account of the fact that they are spending all this time driving about from place to place. In a rural location, that could be quite a long time.

With hotels, you've got a hundred rooms lined up in one building, they are next to each other and have completely standardized interiors, so cleaners can zip quickly down the corridors diving into one room after another and cleaning up rapidly using standardized equipment. A large number of rooms can therefore be cleaned up per shift per cleaner.

How do these early checkouts and late checkins work if you don't have a car to leave your luggage in? We don't have a car and always go on holiday by train. Hotels, IME, always let you leave your bags in a left-luggage room if your checkin isn't until later. Do the AirBnB/holiday cottage places at least let you pop your bags in the hall etc.? Or do you have to find a left-luggage deposit place?

I'm laughing at the whinging that it "took the cleaners time" to clean up the stuff in the dishwasher. I mean no shit Sherlock, unless you can just click your fingers like Mary Poppins cleaning takes time.

I've always been used to stripping beds and emptying the bin. Anything else is a piss take.

Tbh, I think the ones with their 'check out' list don't have cleaners or if they do they pay them
for an hour, it's anything to save £

All the assumptions that breakfast is just a few bowls, when I’m on holiday I’m there to enjoy myself so there will probably be plates, mugs, teapot toast rack etc too. Hell I might even cook a breakfast 😀 plus glasses cups etc from the day and night before. Perfectly reasonable to just leave the dishwasher on IMO, if their cleaners don’t have time to empty it they’ll need to pay them for longer!

The glass one is quite standard we don’t have glass collection where I live. I would just leave them next to the bin in a separate bag? Or take them to a bottle bank most villages have them.

I agree. The vast majority charge a hefty fee for cleaning after the let. Thet ate often no cheaper than a hotel. Going on holiday means not worrying about stuff like this. The last cottage I had was much better. The only request was to empty the bins.

I never strip bedding, only did it the year we went away and it was still covid times.

Glass bottles is normal IME. Never heard about the makeup issue.

It would annoy me if I couldn't leave the dishwasher running!!!

Common in Airbnb type lets
We often stay on holiday parks...check out by 930 and they ask you to strip the beds as well

The bin thing seems reasonable but should provide info.

The towels also...make up does not come out easily. It's often easier on white towels because at least they can bleach them.

I don’t want to strip beds on holiday, I don’t want to see the actual duvet or mattress, I want to be in a fantasy land of no chores.

Stayed in a youth hostel recently and was most impressed with the bedding they provided and changed each day (on request as I moved room) - fluffy white crisp bedding. Perfect.

I didn’t mind stripping the beds during covid, not now. I don’t do that, actually haven’t been asked.

Dishwasher fair enough

Make up on towels is a new one on me. What about blood on towels. That’s surely common. I thought they bleached the towels anyway. Which is why they are always white.

we are clean so hoovering isn’t really necessary.

I refuse to pay top whack for a cottage and then have to be out by 9am and have done all the cleaning and pack the car.

They clean a load of other places! The agencies I’ve seen set the check in/out window wide to give them flexibility.

I've stayed in a cottage like this and I agree it can be way over the top. We didn't read the welcome pack thoroughly as we were only in there to sleep and out all day, and although we booked it as 'dog friendly' there was a clause that the dog was only allowed in the living room area. The owner was unhappy that dog hair was found on the floor in the hallway and charged us for the cleaning of this.
Also upon departure it was very very heavy rain, and I left my DP to sort out the recycling which was to be split into about 8 different boxes slightly down the road with no shelter from the rain. He accidentally put 1 or 2 items in the wrong box and we were also charged for this, in total was £60!!!

It depends on the cleaners, I’ve seen them work in teams of up to 4 so no they can get in flip the cottage and be out in under an hour and be off to the next one. The default setting on my dishwasher is over 3 hours.

I don’t do it anymore but I used to clean cottages and it’d take me a good 4-5 hours for a proper top to bottom clean but I didn’t have rules like bed stripping etc. Agency cleaners don’t work like that.

Think a lot of things such as taking the sheets off etc is now the norm, especially since covid.

We recently stayed in a place where an email was sent over the week before arrival with a pdf attached that had 2 pages of dos and don’t that had to be abided by for the deposit to be given back. Most were pretty standard but a lot we felt were over the top. We had to empty the hot tub water out before we left which I have never had before.

I would not be taking the bottles home, just leave them by the door and they can take them to the bottle bank.

It's fair enough to load the dishwasher on the morning you leave and put it on but there isn't time to unload it after breakfast.

I wouldn't be stripping the beds, you pay for a cleaner in the costs.

LadyAster it’s not just a case of clean the bathroom, change the bedding and throw the hoover around. When I managed a holiday cottage for someone it was a case of doing a decent deep clean of most areas (I have to admit tho that places I’ve stayed totally never cleaned to the standard I did) but a cleaner should be dusting, cleaning and vacuuming each room and also bedding and towels have to be checked and perfected, any consumables replaced. All mattresses and sofas etc. checked under and hoovered, all cupboard checked through and organised, fridge cleaned, oven cleaned etc etc etc the list is endless as there is a standard to have the home set to for each guest it takes a long while to check through everywhere to ensure there aren’t things left by previous guests. Hair grips down the sides of chairs etc. I fully appreciate most are not cleaned to the standard I did it though. I’m going away today and know I will spend the first couple of hours cleaning as it will most probably have only had a quick wipe round and centres of the room vacuumed 🧐

We just stayed in a cottage for a week; and the checkout requests were pretty much the same, except we just had to put any dirty crockery in the dishwasher, and leave it on. They told us where to take the glass for recycling.

In our case, the owner had 5 cottages on their own land; and it’s probably a rush, getting 5 clean on changeover day, in a very rural area? (We had the smallest anyway)

I can’t see your problem OP? We arrived at a nice clean, very well equipped and decorated cottage; the people after us, quite rightly expected the same?

It’s a case of hiring a cottage with the advantage of a lounge to sit in the evenings; the use of our own kitchen with washer/dryer and a washing line in the garden; as against spending an evening in a hotel watching TV from our beds? DH prefers the former although we often have hotel holidays as well?

You pay your money and make your choice?

Me too. I'm happy to strip beds and sweep floors etc. I like to leave a olace tidy. But if we have to be out by 10 then the breakfast stuff goes in the dishwasher.