Feel a bit weird about what my cleaner did.

[DeadlyDead]

My cleaner has been with me for a few years. She’s a very nice woman, but can be a bit sensitive (if I give any feedback/ask for her to change something she does etc. she doesn’t take it well). I trust her- she has her own set of keys for my house, knows the alarm code etc. Good relationship overall- if I’m home when she’s here I’ll make us both coffee and we’ll chat.

She came on Monday for her usual cleaning appointment. I put my Christmas decorations up last weekend and she was very complimentary of them, asking where I got various bits etc. To be fair, I do go a bit OTT and love Christmas and this year’s decorations turned out especially well- I make a lot of stuff myself, and also have been collecting bits for years. We had coffee and then I needed to go out so we said our goodbyes, and I left her to it.

She lives about eight miles away from me, but we’re in the same area.

Today, I went onto Facebook and a post from a local group I’m in came up. It was a photo of someone showing off their Christmas decorations- I had to do a double take because it was my house! Pictures of my living room, hallway, landing, and sitting room, all decked out for Christmas. They were posted by my cleaner (under her own name- we’re not FB friends but both members of this group). The caption is along the lines of “not bad for a tired mum of three” and there are a few thousand likes and a several hundred comments (it’s a very big group). Lots asking where she got various items from and she’s replying, based on her asking me the same thing on Monday! In one comment she didn’t know where something was from and replied “I’ve had that for years, it was originally my Nan’s” 😮 (about a candle holder I got in Next c. 2019!!)

When I first saw it, I was a bit perplexed but didn’t dwell. Now that it’s sunk in, I’m a bit pissed off. My home isn’t instantly recognisable to strangers based on those photos, it does feel like a breach of privacy.

As I said, she can be quite sensitive so even saying this to her gently will likely result in her getting upset, and likely not coming to clean for me again. I can get another cleaner, but I don’t really want things to end this way as I’ve been happy with her until now.

In my shoes, would you be annoyed?

AIBU to be annoyed?

What a weird thing to do

This.

it’s clearly a very different culture and wealth gap.

go for the facts.

She is a good cleaner.

until now you have trusted her.

she made a mistake. but a naive foolish one.

talk to her in the new year before you make a decision.

This is mad but also quite sad. She obviously has no close friends or family in the area as they would recognise it is not the interior of her home. Not a trustworthy person, you need to protect yourself here or next you may see pics online of her wearing your jewelry or clothes etc. My main concern is that she has your keys and it is easy to get copies made. I would not say anything in advance but make sure that you return early the next time she is due to come to clean and have the conversation face to face and definitely get your keys back off her at that point. A new cleaner needs to be sought!

I’d change my keys, alarm and cleaner immediately.

Sorry OP , I agree with most of the posters on here saying to let her go. Quite frankly astonished at some of the ‘I feel sorry for her’ comments..

She has shown herself to be a liar and deceitful and to a large audience where she may know people know you and vice versa.

How on earth do you know what else she has done that she HASN'T posted ???

It’s creepy, it’s weird and it’s an abuse of trust. She would absolutely not be coming into my house again.

Oh I feel a bit sorry for her. She's obviously really impressed and possibly a bit jealous, so just wanted to show them off and live a bit of a fantasy. She'll be mortified if you say something. But yeah I'd be annoyed.

Change the locks.

As someone who cleans for a lady every week, that's just weird! I love her house, her views everything! But do I invade her privacy by taking pictures and pretending they are mine? Absolutely not 😂 that's is strange attention seeking behaviour. Of course she will get upset if you call her on her lies! That's what they are, lies! What else has she been lying about? If she's pretending to random people your house is hers how can you trust her? Strange behaviour

This is brazen in the extreme. Is she so clueless not to think that you might be in the same group? I would have to write something along the lines of, ‘Looks familiar. Next time you come to clean my house, could you actually clean the bathroom rather than taking photos of my tree to pass off as your own? Not even mad. This is hilarious. Glad you like the decorations! I’m flattered! ‘

Does she earn money off these posts and is looking for content?

I can understand not telling her until after Christmas when you have the keys back but you need to tell her the reason why. She needs to know it was wrong and an invasion of your privacy.

I had an acquaintance who did an occasional food stream on insta "xxx cooks" kinda thing.
She copied one of my photos onto there, no mention of me.
I found this weird, bordering on unhinged, I asked her why, she could tell I was offended.
She just couldn't see that there was anything odd in doing this, whereas I just couldn't see how she failed to.
A timely reminder that the people you think are on your wavelength can sometimes be on another planet

It’s giving mentally ill

I’d find another cleaner. We used to have one, and then stopped using her when I started working part time and had more time to do it myself. Then, when I went away working for a few weeks, my husband had her in to clean as a one off before I came home, so everything would look nice. A few weeks later, I saw her advertising her business with a picture of our new bathroom. She hadn’t asked either of us about using the picture. I posted a comment saying she didn’t have permission to use the photo and asking her to take it down. She did, but there was no apology or message. There is no way that woman is ever coming back in our house, and My husband agrees that we’d never use her again. It was a total breach of the trust you place in someone when they come into your home!

This comment cracked me up 🤣🤣🤣

Oh I hope not- we’re a very, very different shape and size!

It's very simple. She's dragged you into her online world. Now you have two options: a) You let it go or b) you sack her.
Personally, I would go for the latter because there is absolutely no real explanation for this behaviour. Flattery doesn't cut it.
If, however, you go for a), you will always be on edge, even subconsciously
If you're going to have servants, you need to learn to be boss. If I ever have that problem, I'm ready!.

This. 100%. She needs sacking.

Let me guess, YOU are the tall, slim one?!

I’m a lot taller than her, but she’s much slimmer than me. Totally different body types.

I honestly wouldn't change all the locks. That seems like a massive over reaction! I'd just tell her next time she comes, that she's no longer needed and to return her keys.

She's posted a pic of the OP's private space on a public forum. That would bother me. The fact that no address is attached to it would be irrelevant.

What she’s done is beyond weird. Once I’d got the keys back I’d be commenting on the FB thread.

“This is my house Doreen. Not sure why you’re pretending it’s yours but this has made me extremely uncomfortable and is why I sacked you”.

I've outlined on other threads the problems that we had.

Our council subcontracted care for my mum from a private care company. I paid for extra care plus cleaning to help me keep on top of things.

I was working full time as a middle manager in a secondary school and my now late husband was poorly.

I realised that some of the staff had built up this fantasy whereby I was keeping my mum in her home so that I - as a seemingly wealthy middle manager with wealthy parents - could inherit.

The reality: Mum's house was rented from the council. Dad had been a coalminer. Mum had learned to speak Standard English instead of Fife dialect when she worked as a housekeeper for a couple in Edinburgh; Dad was originally an Eastern European peasant.

One of the carer/cleaners was the niece of someone who had been in my class at primary school and the sister of one of my former pupils. Dad had trusted her because he thought she was being more thorough than the other carer/cleaners.

The reality: she was casing the house. Money disappeared; Mum's plain gold and silver jewellery was stolen.

I'd trusted this woman. She'd given me various sob stories, including telling me that my former pupil was dying of cancer.

She appeared in our local paper when it came out that she'd conned another client out of 700 to pay for a non-existent funeral.

A year or so later, Mum was in hospital. Lo and behold, I bumped into my terminally ill former pupil. (She was visiting her father.)

She obviously saw the shock on my face. (She was supposed to be dead by then.) The moment that I realised that she had been in on her sister's attempt to scam me out of money was the moment she told me "Oh...I've been cured. By angel therapy."

If you clean for somebody, you do not post their home on Facebook. We had an issue similar with a relative who had engaged a local lady to clean for them. We didn't know they had engaged this person until we saw a video of the relatives home before the cleaning. We made a complaint to the person, explained to our relative who was distressed by it being on the internet for all to see. Cleaner was given her marching orders.

Very unprofessional and that's without the decorations. People's privacy and client confidentiality is paramount!