House Clean

[Fiveinourhouse]

We are new to being landlords and I booked a cleaner to clean our flat before the new tenant moved in. It’s a three bedroomed flat with linoleum flooring and unfurnished. The cleaner tells me it took nine hours to clean. That sounds crazy to me as it was empty and not that bad in the first place. She’s charging per hour and I think she’s taking advantage. Not sure what to do. First time posting so sorry if it’s not ok.

Have you seen it? Have you asked exactly what she did? If she cleaned all the carpets and did a deep clean, including the oven and the kitchen units then that doesn't seem unreasonable to me. It also depends what state the place was in before she started. She sounds good to me spending nine hours on the place - on a purely nosey note, whereabouts is the flat?

It’s in Scotland. No carpets as the on,y carpet is on the stair and a carpet cleaner was there at same time cleaning those. Oven had been professionally cleaned two weeks ago and I checked it the day before she cleaned and it was great. She said it was covered in grease to took ages to clean. The place just needed a hoover and mop and quick wipe down in the bathrooms and kitchen.

She says she cleaned the skirting boards but window ledges etc are dusty still and outside stairs haven’t even been swept or mopped.

What had you agreed with her in advance? It seems very unusual not to have agreed a set price or a set number of hours. 9 hours is more than a full days work for most people so seems v unusual that she would keep going that long without checking in with you. Do you have pictures from before she started cleaning?

It doesn't sound to me as though she's lied. What exactly did you ask her to do? Ime my kitchen looks clean but there's a film of grease around the oven on the tiles and units. It's not rank, but only when I do a full clean is it apparent how bad it is.

Your choice is to dispute that she spent 9 hours on it or just pay the bill. A lot will rest on what it was agreed she'd do.

I would just pay up and next time you have a flat clean be more specific about how many hours you want done, and what you are expecting to be cleaned.

I think it would be very possible to spend a whole day cleaning a 3 bed flat inc windows, oven, skirting, grouting, sills, front door, fridge, inside cupboards etc. So it depends what was done really.
Like others, I think you should pay if you hadn't agreed in advance exactly what she should do and how long you estimated for it.

Ime my kitchen looks clean but there's a film of grease around the oven on the tiles and units. It's not rank, but only when I do a full clean is it apparent how bad it is.

^totally this

My kitchen looks fab but I can spend (or my cleaner can spend) an hour just de-greasing the cooker hood which didn't even LOOK dirty.

The flat is still filthy and she was seen out and about in the next town in the morning so clearly couldn’t have been there all day. She lied about cooker being covered in grease as it was professionally cleaned and checked by myself the day before. When I questioned her she said the time was spent cleaning the skirtingboards so I returned to the flat to look at them and they were still dusty etc

Well that's one heck of a dripfeed OP. If you have proof she wasn't there nine hours then don't pay her.