Cleaner leaving early

[Alexteaaddict]

My cleaner is paid for 3 hours per week and consistently leaves early.
I work from home. She comes to me and says, "I am leaving now".
I feel like I am being taken advantage of because, from the first week, I paid her for the full 3 hours plus 10% tip. I have always paid her the same, but its now getting worse, she left 40 minutes early this week.

She doesn't do any dusting of the surfaces. So I usually spent a few hours at the weekend doing this.

My concern is that if I confront her politely, she might stay the full hours but with resentment. I don't want my toothbrush dipping in the loo bowl!

Is it the unwritten rule that cleaners leave early or should I raise it, toothbrush be damned????

Of course, raise it.
Give her a list of the jobs she’s missing, including the dusting!

If she was getting everything done and leaving 10-15 minutes early I couldn't get worked up about it, but you are talking about someone doing a below average job and leaving over half an hour earlier than she is being paid for. Unacceptable. Either tell her you've noticed she finishes within 2.5 hours so you will reduce her pay accordingly, or tell her she needs to stay for 3 hours and do a more comprehensive job. Or ask her to leave and find a new cleaner!

Well you either raise it, and it gets sorted, or you don’t raise it, and it never gets sorted.

Alternatively, you could cancel her entirely and get a new cleaner.

I had this. told them I didn't need their services anymore and found new cleaners. if the job had been done to a high standard I would have kept them but the cleaning and leaving earlier got worse and worse. I only regret that I left it so long!

I wouldn't raise the issue of hours but would talk to her about the required outcomes: e.g. proper dusting. If the outcomes are achieved earlier, then she can go home as it would obviously be pointless just hanging around for the sake of it. Unfortunately, if she works just 20 minutes of the third hour and the outcomes are achieved, I don't see how you could pay her for 20 minutes of the hour as she is not likely to find alternative work for the remaining 40 minutes, so you'd have to just either renegotiate the whole job to make it outcome based and fixed or pay for 3 hours as agreed. Another alternative is, of course, to find another cleaner and specify all expected outcomes at the start and now that you know how long things take, you could look at agreeing fixed price to avoid future problems.

I would replace her.

Anyone paid to do just 3 hours work, yet still leaves early isn't someone I would want in my home.

There isn't any amount of house cleaning that can be done in under 3 hours. There will always be stuff that needs doing to complete the agreed time. I couldn't be arsed having to explain this to someone tbh.

I would just tell her not to come back & replace her. She sounds lazy.

Id just find someone else. What the fuck is your cleaner actually doing if she isn't dusting?

This issue comes up constantly on here. Tolerate it, or don’t. I wouldn’t.

I'd speak to her informally and give her a chance

She’s taking advantage of, 40 mins is taking the piss
as pp said, job done well and 10-15 mins early fine but not this.
i wouldn’t bother micromanaging, i would just replace with someone who does the job properly

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Are you paying her afterwards?

I'd pay her for 2h20 if thats all she stayed.

I'd just say "I've noticed you often leave early - does the house not need 3 hours of cleaning? I cam pay you for 2.5 hours instead if that's better?"

I had this exact same issue. I let her go because frankly there is no rowing back from this. It tells me that she has no issue with working 2.5 hours and letting me pay her for 3 hours and frankly I was paying her over the odds anyway, and I do that because I value having a cleaner and am not trying to shaft anyone. I expect the same from her.

Let her go and get a cleaner who doesn’t leave early