One off spring clean from a cleaning service - has anyone had this? Several questions

[mrsgboring]

The housework is getting on top of me and DH. We are all ill and under stress so I'd really like to buy our way out of a hole and have some cleaners in to blitz the house. It doesn't need to be gleaming from top to bottom, just get it straight and be less work than doing a half-arsed job ourselves.

Has anyone done it? Is it worth it? And also, the house is a messy tip as well as a bit dirty, so presumably we'd have to tidy it up first, or can they clean round the mess to a certain extent? again.

Will they use a lot of strong chemicals I wouldn't want to be breathing in whilst pg and badly asthmatic?

Can anyone recommend a company?

Where do you live?

My cleaners (when I had them over the Summer) only did the bits I wanted them to as the whole house didn't need it.

Make a list of exactly what you want cleaned. My cleaners just used my products but some places have their own stuff.

I once booked a cleaner from a local cleaning company to come in and help me clean and tidy. It was brilliant - she was a lovely motherly lady (although I think she may have been younger than me!) and we spent the day just blitzing everything. She helped me clutter clear a bit - and as an added bonus she put the bags of rubbish in her van and dropped them off in the tip on her way home!

Think I might do it again before Christmas!

Thanks, inscotland. I'm in Oxfordshire, and know there are local companies and national franchises, but otherwise know nothing of any of it.

My main thing is how tidy I would have to get the house to have a cleaner, because once it's tidy it's not that hard to clean, so if everything has to be picked up and away there isn't much point in a cleaner and we'll just have to struggle on as we are (which is reasonably comfortably situated, but just having a bit of a hard time so I really shouldn't moan.)

Seeker that sounds great. Do you think this is the sort of service other companies/people might offer?

Mind you, if I had a day undisturbed in the house to devote to spring cleaning it,I could probably manage on my own.

These are who I have heard of... they have franchises everywhere!www.merrymaids.co.uk

Or maybe you need a de-cluttering company instead?Just a thought...

Apart from a couple of shelves of random junk, it all goes away and is used/useful, it just isn't put away, so I don't think I need to declutter so much as tidy and clean.

Have you used Merry Maids, can you recommend?

I rang up a local company and explained what I wanted. I actually said I wanted someone who could do what my mother used to do before she got too frail - someone to help and encourage and bully and stop me being too sentimental about my junk.

And because I was paying her I was determined to get my money's worth so I actually did it, rather than drinking tea and procrastinating!