To pay less?

[WWYDwiththisone]

I did another thread some days ago about how our cleaner that we booked to do a deep clean of our new house and they did not do a satisfactory job. Doing a new thread as it’s a different question and not many will come back for the update I’ve just done

She said they work in pairs and would stay for as long as it took to do the job. £23 an hour each. I requested they prioritised the kitchen and the bathroom, particularly the toilet and the bath.

They arrived an hour late after running over from another job. She stayed for just under 1.5hrs before going home because they were ‘hungry’ and hadn’t eaten since breakfast. This was despite telling me they’d stay however late because they’d sorted childcare and so weren’t in a rush.

Now have a bill for nearly £70 for 1.5hrs of the two of them ‘cleaning’ my house. Our bathroom is small, 2mx2.5m max. They cleaned the bathroom walls (apparently there was loads of limescale), bath, sink and half of an IKEA wardrobe. The other half of it was dirty and covered in pet hair. They didn’t clean the toilet or the bathroom floor. There were two of them. Before they left, they said ‘we’ll come back tomorrow’ to DH. DH hadn’t booked them so just agreed, he was decorating and I was at work so nobody directly watching over them. I text her in the evening to thank her for what she’d done (before I saw how little they’d done) but please not to come back as we needed it that day, so I was going to have to tackle it myself in the morning instead

I’ve reasonably approached her and said we are dissatisfied with the service and she is refusing to budge on price saying they’d be working for less than the minimum wage. She has also said I’m lucky she hasn’t charged a late payment fee as we haven’t cleared the invoice 24hrs after the work was done.

Is it reasonable to pay them for 1hr each instead, or even just minimum wage for the time they were there?

I don’t know where I stand on it legally and don’t want to invite trouble given that they know my address- maybe overthinking here

WWYD?

YABU - you’ve got to pay the £70 and chalk it up to experience

YANBU - pay less / will comment

If they've done 1.5 hours work each they need paying for 1.5 hours each.

Don't pay them anything at all until they come back and do the job properly.

I'd call their bluff and let them take you to the small claims court.

Essentially you are saying that two people spent 1.5 hours cleaning your house and only managed to clean the bathroom walls, bath sink and half a wardrobe?

They were also late

Said they'd stay as long as needed but bailed after 1.5 hours.

They sound like a shit show.

PP on other thread brought up the point that it’s better not to piss people off, as if they know where you live and hold a grudge… I dunno what I think they’d do though. We have home security alarms and cameras.

They did a shit job, they deserve shit pay. There is no way in the world I’d pay £70 for what you describe.

Would you have reservations about paying less in terms of annoying them though?

And £70 isn't less than min wage. It's £23.33 per hour each.

As for not pissing people off who know where you live, if they cause issues call the police. Unless of course you have the cleaners mafia where you live

Nah I wouldn’t be paying that for such a poor job. They set the expectation and bailed. I would pay 50% and tell them i wouldn’t leave honest reviews to draw a line under it. If they kicked up a stink I would probably tell my local network how crap they were.

I would pay half and let them take you to court if they like. They sound like complete con artists!

They said if I pay less than £69 they’d be working for less than minimum wage because their insurance is expensive……. Lol

I feel conned!

I've been a cleaner and it's not just business insurance, car with business insurance, travel time between jobs needs paid. I fthey didn't work the full 3 hours don't pay for it but I'd stump up for 2.5 and just write it off and write a shit review.

So they only worked there for 1.5 hours .I would only pay them for the hours they worked.

I would have reservations because I hate upsetting people but my hopefully the anger I felt at them taking the piss would carry me through!

Like you said, there’s not much they can do without becoming criminals. They’re unlikely to take you to court but if they do you can defend it.

I would just pay. They can do a lot more than £70 damage pretty quickly and you really don't know what type of people they know. But if they work for an agency I would complain to the agency.

I can't get my head round why you'd agree to such a contract in the first place.

I was initially thinking 'you have to pay and chalk it up to experience' but then I re-read OP. Are you really saying that 2 people, cleaned part of a bathroom, between them in 1.5 hours? That can't be the case.

Surely whoever let them in had an inkling of what they were/ weren't doing ?

If you're worried about upsetting them then just pay them. THEN, in November, write to the HM Tax Revenues and advise them that you have paid a cleaning company in your area and show them the evidence. But don't advise HM Tax before November because the cleaners have until the end of October to advise the tax people themselves. So come November, if they haven't, and you show evidence to the Tax Man (and it only takes a quick email) then they'll be in trouble.

Yep, that’s exactly right unfortunately. And half of a large wardrobe

Do you think? Like what?

1.5hrs each so 3 x £23

They prob did 1hr 20 ish each

She also said (after I said I wasn’t happy) that she didn’t cover our area and was doing so out of goodwill so we should feel fortunate she didn’t charge for petrol. This was never mentioned, our house is 2.5 miles / 10 minute drive from her home address…

No tell them you will not be paying as they turned up late, left early, did not complete the required tasks and what they did do was of such poor standard that you had to redo and complete yourself.

Tell her to take you to court. Tell her you will contact trading standards. She will soon jog on.

Total chancer.

This is my instinct too. Would you not pay anything then? I feel as though I have to compromise with them morally. I would worry they’d hold a grudge - usually I’d put this down to my own anxiety but the fact a couple of posters have said it now is making me question.

If they did 1 hour 20 mins each is it really worth arguing the 10 mins each?