Cleaner has cost me £1600

[Bootsybugs22]

I was out of the country for two days and my regular ckeaner (for 5 months) went in to clean whilst I was away. She letnherself in via a back door key left in a safe place. Our decking is really slippy so I said if she needed to go in and out she coulds use the front door once she was in. I text her to say the front door keys were square yale , labelled and in a key pot in the hall.

We have a front modern door to the porch and an older wooden self locking door from porch to house.

She called me whilst away to say she was locked in the porch because the keys i left didn't fit the door. She had picked up some other keys out the fruit bowl in the kitchen.

I called a locksmith. In the meantime she called back and said that stressful situations increase her risk of a seizure (she's epileptic) and I needed to get her out now. So I called my neighbour and asked them to force the rear back paito door. This is because the cleaner had passed the keys she had through the letterbox and one of them was for the rear patio door but not the main opener. So the neighbour tried to force the secondary door open as it could be unlocked. Anyway door got broken in the process.

Locksmith arrived. Drilled the lock, got her out, fitted a new lock. But before he'd arrived the door had been damaged by the neighbour (I gave them permission to force the door)

Today I paid the locksmith £85. Had a man round to quote on repair of the door (£1500 for new set of doors.... not repairable).

I messaged the cleaner and asked if she had insurance. She's now blocked me on WhatsApp but messaged me separately on normal text messaging to say she cancelled her insurance last year when she got her epilepsy diagnosis (why?!).

I'm at a total loss. AIBU that I want SOME recompense even if uts £85?

Can’t you claim on home insurance?

I doubt you will get a penny out of her.
Try your Home insurance

Sorry OP, but I think as you gave the neighbours permission to rescue her, then you have to accept responsibility for the cost of repairs. Of course she should have made sure that she had the correct keys before shutting herself in the porch, but these things happen when you're not used to another person's house.

You have virtually no chance of recovering this money

Can you review her honestly online? I am a cleaner and in no way defending her.... Did she ever tell you she was insured?

Having just re-read your post, why didn't you leave the front door keys in a safe place, rather than letting her in the back door in the first place?

Lucky she had her phone on her when she got trapped!

I think everyone one who reads this can take it as warning to check cleaners have insurance. Did you have a written service contract with her that said she was insured?

I think your own house insurance is your best bet, most have a locks and keys clause.

I think you should have just let her come and go using the back door keys and as you instructed the neighbour to force the door so the cost is on you.

I think you should try your own home insurance. Your key system sounds really complicated. And this coming in one door and going out another is a bit if a recipe for disaster.

i don’t really understand why it would be stressful if you have a phone. Just sit down and watch Netflix or TikTok. You know someone is on their way.

I'll try to cover questions. I didn't leave the front door keys as we didn't have a safe place out the front. I figured if she went round the back to retrieve keys she may as well go in the back. But I offered up the front so she didn't lug a hoover and kit around the back over the slippy decking. In hindsight, whilst I thought I was being helpful clearly it wasn't.

Insurance, yes when I took her on she said she was insured. I don't know any of my friends or family who have a written contract with their cleaner. So no I don't have a contract.

I'm going to have to suck this one up. I got a cleaner because I finally earned a little extra money and I thought it would help me day to day reduce the load but overall it's caused me so much more stress and mental load to organise her. I was going to let her go before Christmas anyway because she's unreliable. But I didn't as I felt bad to do it over Christmas.

It was honestly a one off. I'm usually here. I work from home.

She shouldn't be working without insurance but you told the neighbour to force the door and you left keys around that weren't for the door. You should have left them clearly marked and put all others away if you wanted her to use them

I think this is not her fault. A very unfortunate situation but one you probably just have to suck up as you say.

Sorry, I think it is at least partially on you. People do have quirky door and house set-ups that seem obvious to them because they use them every day but they're not be obvious or easy to someone who is unfamiliar. (And let's face it some people are very easily confused!)

She should have had insurance. You should have put the front door key by itself so she didn't pick the wrong one. The slippery deck and ability to be locked in the porch without a key aren't ideal either! Try your own insurance and maybe make your home setup a bit easier for other people to navigate.

Having two sets of doors configured in a way that means it’s reasonably easy to lock yourself in a porch is a pretty stupid situation to have in your house to start with if you’re going to have people there alone.

I think this is on you and your house insurance - the locksmith because your door setup is asking for trouble and the replacement other doors because you overreacted and told a neighbour to break them when cleaner should just have been told to sit tight until the emergency locksmith showed up.

she should have insurance, but that is for if she breaks something during the normal course of working. I’ve had cleaners break things that I should not have left where I left them and I did not have the cleaner make a claim or reimburse me. It was my fault for being careless, not their fault. Their insurance should be for when they cause a situation. If the client essentially sets them up to fail, we need to accept responsibility and not risk them dealing with higher insurance rates.

Technically she did not break anything. You will have to claim on your insurance.

She could just as easily had an epileptic episode while alone in your house snd injured herself—would you have been covered for that?

She sounds like an absolute charlatan. Sorry to say you won’t see a penny of that back.

Was it really necessary to let her clean whilst you are out of the country for 2 days, it sounds so confusing with the varying locations of the different keys for different doors

Couldn’t you just have cut her a set of keys? We don’t have a cleaner at the moment but when we did they had their own set. Would you have been insured if a burglar let themselves in with keys they found in a safe place?

You could have got a key safe fitted as a safe place
Like lots of Air B'n'Bs and elderly people have

So she didn't follow your instructions, picked up the wrong keys to the front door, then managed to get trapped between the front door and the self locking porch door?

So where were the keys to the porch door? On the same key ring as the front door one?

She should be paying for this as the only reason you got the neighbour to rescue her is because she told you that it would cause her to have an epileptic episode. It's not your fault she had her insurance cancelled.

Claim on your own insurance and then they can claim off her?

She sounds hopeless but I can't see any way of getting money back from her. Maybe best to claim on home insurance and leave an honest review online if possible.