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Original poster

Employing a cleaner - any tips for a first timer?

24 replies

puddle · 21/02/2006 14:05

Have wanted a cleaner for ages and have now possibly found one - she is coming to see me this week to discuss.

What do I need to ask her?

She said around £7 an hour - is this average (she said we could negotiate it though as she wasn't sure - she hasn't done cleaning for a while and didn't know what the going rate is).

Any tips greatly appreciated

OP posts:
Lio · 21/02/2006 14:33

Bump as I also want to know. How does you know how long cleaning takes to do?

Lio · 21/02/2006 14:34

Ahem, cock-up on the grammar front.

Kathy1972 · 21/02/2006 15:59

We pay ours £6.50 an hour (for two hours). That's in East Yorkshire where everything is fairly cheap - if you are eg in London I would expect you would pay more.
In 2 hours she hoovers and dusts the house (3 bedrooms but doesn't get very messy as we only have an 8 months dd), washes the kitchen and bathroom floor, wet cleans the bathrooms and tells us all the village gossip. Sometimes she has some time left over and eg cleans some windows. She is so, so worth the money....

We didn't know how long either in the beginning and the plan was she'd do all the wet cleaning every week but just hoover and dust upstairs and downstairs alternate weeks, but she just started doing it all in the time. I imagine the time taken is different for everyone depending on whether they clean up every speck or just do a fairly quick job and get the worst of it up, so I probably wouldn't be worried as long as it was clear they were getting on with the job.

Original poster
puddle · 21/02/2006 16:39

Thanks Kathy. I am in brighton - £7 sounds ok to me, but only based on gut feeling tbh.

I think it will be two hours a week - no idea what she'll get done in that time though.

Anyone else?

OP posts:
Bink · 21/02/2006 17:25

We decided on scope of work by going round the flat thinking about what we'd like done and how long it would take us, so that we ended up with a list of jobs that felt fair for [x] hours. Also, once you work it out that way you don't feel complicated if you have the fantastic kind of cleaner who whooshes through the work.

Certain things are difficult to time, though - people are enormously different in how long ironing takes. Do you want her to iron?

Bink · 21/02/2006 17:26

Oh, by the way, £7 sounds very fair. We are in central London and get our cleaners by advertising on gumtree, and we usually offer £7/hour and get lots of (good) people applying.

Original poster
puddle · 21/02/2006 18:30

No, no ironing. I can only afford a couple of hours a week and my priority is cleaning! I can manage the ironing in front of the Tv....

OP posts:
Davros · 21/02/2006 20:02

I'm in London NW3 and I pay £7ph. I would advise not to give her a key if you can be there to let her in. I think our insurance policy is funny about who has keys, how many are floating around etc. I'm not saying I wouldn't trust the cleaner, but you don't know where they are, who they are with, with the key to your house in their bag plus ours come and go and I'd probably have lost a fair few keys by now and had to get new locks for insurance policy (that was long) (and boring).

Kathy1972 · 22/02/2006 08:51

Gosh, it never occurred to me not to give ours a key.... However, ours is the 'village cleaner' and has worked for other people in the village for years so there's a high level of trust if you see what I mean....
She colour codes the keys for the different houses rather than labels them - if you were going to give him/her a key you might want to insist on something like that?

Firefox · 22/02/2006 08:57

£7 an hour sounds reasonable to me - we are just outside of London. You'll need to find out

  1. If you will be supplying cleaning materials or will she
  2. If you will be paying her for holiday - and if so how many weeks
  3. What happens if she breaks something in your home
  4. Establish with her what she will clean (eg mine does the fridge, oven, microwave, light fittings, doors - and this is an addition to hoovering, polishing etc. When I was heavily pg she also changed the beds for me.
Firefox · 22/02/2006 08:57

£7 an hour sounds reasonable to me - we are just outside of London. You'll need to find out

  1. If you will be supplying cleaning materials or will she
  2. If you will be paying her for holiday - and if so how many weeks
  3. What happens if she breaks something in your home
  4. Establish with her what she will clean (eg mine does the fridge, oven, microwave, light fittings, doors - and this is an addition to hoovering, polishing etc. When I was heavily pg she also changed the beds for me.
Davros · 22/02/2006 20:11

With Key you MUST find out if insurance policy has anything in it about who has keys.

sunnydelight · 22/02/2006 20:33

£7 an hour is pretty much the going rate around Brighton at the moment. I had to lose my last cleaner - I knew that 3 hours was more than enough time for what I was asking her to do, and couldn't understand why it seemed to take her so long. One day she spent 2 hours cleaning my (tiny) bathroom!!!! All became clear the day I was actually at home when she arrived and she stank of skunk - I felt so stupid for not working out what was going on

Nonyummymummy · 22/02/2006 20:38

We live in North London in a three bedroomed house and pay for 3 hours cleaning per week (2 ladies for 1.5 hours), once a month they do an extra hour in total to do a more thorough clean. They charge £7.50 per hour. They do a similiar clean to K1972's desc. I have been using cleaners for 10 years now and it can be a bit of a lottery in terms of standard of cleanliness. Mine always have keys and I have never had any problems with things going missing, more breakages but then accidents can happen to any of us. They also come and go a bit so if I keep one for 2 years I feel very lucky! Although last time my outgoing one recommended my new ones so that worked well. I always take up references.
One of my cleaners suggested coming for a trial clean when I was in to establish exactly what needed doing - that was a good idea.
I have never paid for holidays (this has never come up) but I normally have the cleaners in when I am on holiday even if there isn't much to do and usually give them an extra week's money at Christmas.
I supply all the cleaning materials.

Original poster
puddle · 23/02/2006 10:49

Gosh it never occured to me to pay her holiday money. Does anyone esle do this?

Another question - am going to put her on a trial period - any idea how long this should be?

Do you all ask for refs?

OP posts:
Original poster
puddle · 23/02/2006 11:17

oh, come on...you've all got cleaners haven't you?

OP posts:
trice · 23/02/2006 11:18

Put a dead spider or a bit of fluff in the middle of the carpet to check it gets hoovered (devious? moi?).

Make sure that they don't put a cloth round the loo and then clean your sink with it (I have seen this twice).

Supply your own products to avoid chemical overload.

Can't get a cleaner for less than £10ph in Harrogate.

Original poster
puddle · 23/02/2006 11:20

lol trice - like the dead spider trick.

I was a cleaner when I was sixth former - did offices. Used to mop the floor in the loos and then use the mop to do the loo seats too .

My favourite thing was the floor buffer - it was ride-on. Happy days.

OP posts:
hovely · 23/02/2006 12:41

Spell things out really clearly. I have made a room-by room list which is extremely detailed, at the risk of being a PITA at first then I am actually v tolerant and easy going but can point to it if things get sloppy later.
If you have any quirks like wooden floors decide what exactly you want her to do with them;
decide whether she is supposed to move furniture, clean under it, or what, and make sure you have allowed enough time for that as it adds a lot;
decide for yourself how tidy the place is usually going to be when she arrives, and accept that if she has to spend time picking up bits of jigsaw, lego then she will not have enough time to do something else.
Time - we have 4 bedrooms, and large rooms, and have 4 hours p/w.

bunyanvillas · 23/02/2006 13:27

Is your cleaner covered by insurance - ie in case she has an accident in your home? Did you see a copy of the insurance policy? I've just taken on a cleaner and wonder if I need to do this ...

hovely · 23/02/2006 15:09

bunyanvillas I always assumed your own home insurance includes public liability, ie your own responsibility to someone who has an accident in your home. I have never come across a cleaner who brought her own insurance...

vickiyumyum · 23/02/2006 15:26

we have just got rid of our cleaners, i am on maternity leave and cannot justify it to myself to pay someone to do what i have already done! will probably want to get ehm back in again quickly afetr the baby is born though.

i used to advertise in shop windows etc for our cleaners, but after ahving a few unreliable ones, went with an agency. they ssend 2 cleaners for two hours a week for £30, this means that once a week my kitchen is cleaned form top to bottom, both bathrooms, the downstairs loo, hoovered and dusted all the way through. i also expect my skirting boards to have been wiped, the light swithces cleaned and if item son the floor e.g kids bedroom and books, for them to be picked up and left in aneat pile. i don't expect them,to tidy up generally, but sometimes i check on the boys rooms in the morning and by the time we have left fotr school/work they have got things out and not put them away.
i used to have acleaner who was fantastic for 4 hours she charged £35 and that would include stripping the beds, putting on fresh sheets and an hours ironing! she used to amanage all this and the cleaning as well, and i often used to leave her extra money or flowers or a little gift to say thanks, but she retired and i haven't found anyone on a par with her.

hovely · 23/02/2006 16:00

sorry, had to leave quickly before as DS woke up.
My top tip would be to hire somebody who has looked after their own home! students are RUBBISH by and large as they have no experience and no sense of the constant need to maintain a home.

Davros · 23/02/2006 18:57

All mine have been cash in hand, no questions asked. So I certainly don't pay for holidays or insurance (I don't think your normal insurance covers this as I had to take out extra for helpers for DS).

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