How to tell cleaner she’s doing a crap job…….

[Rugrats103]

Obviously nicely, but I’m throughly fed up tbh.

Old cleaner who was with us for 4 years was absolutely fantastic, really thorough with great attention to detail but she decided to move into a different career and gave up her business in June.

Lady who I walk the dogs with in my village recommended her cleaner of 10 years, said she was amazing etc.

Said cleaner started in July and I’m honestly completely baffled as to how other lady could say she’s amazing (unless of course it’s just my house she’s not doing a good job in)

She’s meant to come for 2 hours a week, yet every week she leaves 20-30 mins early, if I’m WFH she sticks her head into my study and cheerfully says ‘right I’m done, see you next week’ Annoyingly I’m always just about to have a meeting or really busy with stuff and so to be fair, I kind of just say oh okay thanks and then off she goes.

When I then go round and see what she’s done, quite often things just aren’t clean. Kitchen sink left with marks all in it still, the tap all still covered in watermarks and just blatently not been cleaned. Hob not been touched?!

Upstairs it’s just similar again, showers still looking grubby, there are a few shampoo bottles on the side of the bath in the main bathroom and when I picked them up, there was the dirty imprint of the bottom of them on the bath so she’d obviously not even bothered to pick them up, just wiped around them.

When she first came she said ‘ohhh, your house is so easy to clean because it’s already so clean and tidy’ I think trying to justify why she was leaving early as she left early from day 1! She’s right in that I do keep the house very tidy as I can’t stand mess etc but after a week, it’s definitely not clean. Showers/ baths/ sinks etc all still dirty. Kitchen worktops have sauce splashes on them, the hob has the same etc just usual weekly dirt.

For context it’s a big, 4 bed detached and when I clean it easily takes me 2.5 hours and that’s obviously not a deep clean, just a general clean of all the rooms and hoovering the whole house.

Has anyone ever had to give constructive criticism to a cleaner? I’m unsure how to say anything without offending her, hence why I haven’t said anything up til now. The only thing I’ve said is a couple of weeks ago ‘if you could just make sure the hob gets cleaned, that’d be great’ after yet another week of the hob being missed. She did it that week but then last week it was missed again.

I feel like I should give her a chance to rectifying things before making the decision to get rid (she is a lovely lady in all other respects) but I’m worried about offending her.

I agree. I have a list printed out of what I expect to be done. I have had three amazing cleaners over the years (I am physically disabled), but then I had one who was a nightmare! Wanted to do what she wanted, rather than what I needed doing. Didn't wipe down my kitchen one week because she wanted to brush down the lobby. She complained about having to use a steam cleaner. She just didn't seem to realise that I was the employer and she was the employee. She only lasted two weeks before I got rid of her.

This! If you really think she can improve you could give her a tick list of what you need doing, otherwise let her go.

I completely understand! Same as someone who raved about her ex nanny. I wfh PT at that time so could clearly see and hear what went on. Baffled as to how this person raved about her. Most useless and disinterested person to be around children! I then realised all the people she worked for left their kids in some charge as they worked out of the house the whole day. The friend who recommended her said her kids were so much better after they started attending nursery! Go figure.

I would just let her go. Not worth the hassle