What can I hire a cleaner to do?

[ShastaBeast]

We really need a cleaner but could do with more help than usual - I have mobility issues and DH and one child has ADHD so it's out of control here. Luckily DH has a new job with pay increase which more than covers the cost.

As well as the typical floors, surfaces, kitchen and bathroom cleaning is it's ok to pay to include additional tasks such as -

Folding and putting away kids' clothes
Changing and washing the bedding
Ironing DH's work shirts
Emptying bins and taking out the recycling
Ad hoc bits like the oven, fridge, vacuuming under sofa cushions etc.

I'll approach some cleaners locally but don't want to enquire about doing the extras if it's totally unreasonable to include them. We are a ground floor two bed so not that big and no stairs.

All of those sound reasonable to me - some cleaners will be fine about doing the additional tasks, some will not do ironing though, for example. Agreeing an additional hour a month for things like cleaning the oven, fridge and inside of windows on a rotating basis is a great idea.

Im not a cleaner but if i was i'd do all that except cleaning the oven..there is no amount of money to get me to do that.....

I am a cleaner and laundry /ironing is an acceptable request.

Once you have found a cleaner you trust you can request whatever you find needs doing imo.
I have been known to feed /water chickens and bath dogs in my time!!

I'm a cleaner and I've done all of the above except ironing but would do it as extra.

I always wonder if I could hire a cleaner in a sort of one off purge sort of way. So many cleaners only seem to clean the houses of the already cleanliness and tidyness obsessed, that I wonder if they would freak out at 'real' cleaning.

Also, once you get a cleaner, does the definition of 'absolutely filthy' move to equal 'something dust on a picture rail'?

My cleaner will.
I think self employed cleaners tend to be a bit more flexible over most things than agencies, where they tend to be clearer about what their staff will / won't do.
My elderly, disabled neighbour's lovely cleaner does all sorts of errand and tasks that would never come under a cleaner's 'normal job description' as she feels she is there to make life easier for my neighbour and, as long as she's doing something that is useful for her, then she doesn't mind what it is.

I'm in the process of hiring a cleaner, I'm asking them to do floors, window ledges, surfaces in kitchen. I've also asked them to put the clothes into piles e.g, my sons clothes, my clothes and my husbands clothes and sit them on my bed and only the clothes hanging on the clothes horse.

I won't ask them to do anything else.

I'm paying £10 an hour, is that ok? I've never had a cleaner before.

Scaryclown you can get cleaners to do a one off spring clean. We did this a couple of years and they did a fantastic job

It depends on the cleaner but some will definitely do those things. The oven is the main exception, most cleaners I've had won't touch them, I think because oven cleaning chemicals tend to be nasty. But you can get a specialist oven cleaner in if needed.

You can also get someone in who just does ironing. And I sometimes get a service wash done at the dry cleaner for sheets.

Thanks that really helpful. We need a housekeeper to really keep my sanity but that isn't going to happen.

Actually the oven needs replacing rather than cleaning so I won't ask for that. I'm planning to buy a self cleaning one.

We had a cleaner for a while after I had surgery but her English wasn't great so it was a struggle to communicate which is so important.