Cleaners and expectations

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LiE

LiE

LiE

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I'm struggling to find cleaners that do a decent clean so thought I'd see if my experience is normal. We've been through a few cleaners and noticed that all of them simply spray cleaning stuff on a surface and give it a wipe over, they don't 'finish' it or buff it dry. This means most surfaces although clean you can see a smeary mess where the product has dried on, in whatever way they ran the cloth over it.

Is this normal? When I do my own cleaning I spray on a product and wipe it over, but I then flip the cloth to a dry side and wipe it back to remove the excess product. This doesn't leave any smears.

Couple of photos:

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It probably comes down to the time they are allocated in my experience. Have a cleaner in once a week for 2 hours and expect the whole house to be done and they won't have time to do the bits you are picking up. As they are often paid by the hour and asked to do a set number of rooms / places you are limiting yourself to the quality of finish by the time you pay for.

Unless they are chatting, on their phone, working really slowly then I'd suggest speaking to them and offering an extra bit of time to allow for the finish you require.
 
Have you specified what you want them to do? If not, they may presume you are happy with the wipe and spray approach.

I agree with you by the way, I wouldn't be happy with that either.
 
Our cleaner spends four hours a week in our house and still misses stuff, I've often been working from home and she works solid non stop, can't moan about it really. It just needs more than four hours to clean a five bed house that has two adults and two kids in it.
 
Maccapacca said:
Our cleaner spends four hours a week in our house and still misses stuff, I've often been working from home and she works solid non stop, can't moan about it really. It just needs more than four hours to clean a five bed house that has two adults and two kids in it.
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Nail. Head. Hit.

Takes Herself and I a day to get our whole house clean to Her standards.
 
I went through about 10 and gave up.

I can do a deep clean on one of our en-suites in about 60 minutes. This is making it sparkling.

Our last few were taking 2 hours + to do an average job, so leaving small streaks on the towel radiators or glass etc.

I’m OCD so don’t expect anyone to go as good of a job, but I expect for them to do nearly as good as me for the same time, OR do an Ok job but take less time and fit in other tasks.

Around here they aren’t even that cheap, around £15ph with agent fees.
 
I would not be happy with that either
Perhaps have a word and pay her a bit more for a better finish?

never had a cleaner
Thought about getting one but perhaps my ocd will get the better of me
I have high cleaning expectations lol
 
If I was paying around £15 ph and had a cleaner for 2 hours, I'd probably expect all rooms to be vacuumed and dusted, along with the toilet, kitchen and bathroom to be wiped down with antibacterial / cif.

It usually takes me about 2 hours to clean and vacuum our 3 bed semi to an 'ok' standard and I'm usually knackered after it! If I had to do that 3/4 times per day, 5 days a week like cleaners do, I wouldn't expect the most thorough clean.

I suppose you could ask them to prioritise things like kitchen cupboards / surfaces that shows smears easily and sacrifice the time spent elsewhere.
 
Ours does a great job, everything is cleaned and buffed so no streaks anywhere. But she came round to see the house first and to ask what we wanted done and told us how many hours is needed to do it.

I think if you set an unrealistic time for the cleaner there is always going to be things missed in order to get the main parts done. It takes surprisingly long to clean things really well.
 
We're lucky in that my mother in law comes and does our cleaning.

She's usually here about 3 hours a week and alternates between front room/kitchen etc and then bedrooms/bathrooms, and then we just hoover/wipe round in between. She does a much better job than i would ever manage. no one needs to move beds to clean under them every other week!

The downside is that she's a lot more willing to shout at me for leaving a mess than a regular cleaner :(
 
Similar experience, we went through various cleaners before we found the correct one. We have around 4.5 hours per week (3 bedroom). I would not accept the above, neither would my cleaner. We pay for the job, some weeks she is here much longer but is a family member with massive OCD, so she will not leave until the job is perfect. It takes a long time to get things properly done and can easily spend 1+ hr plus on the kitchen.

For a business to make money this type of cleaning is not viable unless you are willing to pay a lot more.
 
Thanks guys for the insight. We are looking to get someone over for a trial clean next week, she is more expensive and doesn't quote based on time, but on size of home. She is £45 for a weekly clean.

If she doesn't work out then I may have to do it myself !
 
I would suggest that if you have a 'standard' that you expect your cleaner to meet, you get them to shadow you, whilst you clean to the expected standard, then see if they are happy to meet those standards. No point complaining that your cleaner does not meet your standard if you have never shown them exactly what your standard is. Commercial cleaning standards and domestic cleaning standards are often 2 very different things. It takes me a full day to clean our 6 bed from top to bottom, including bathrooms. That is a full 8 hours. I would expect a cleaner to be around 50% quicker, so I would be looking to pay for 6 hours if I wanted the same. As it is we pay our cleaner for 3 hours, for which we get hoovering dusting and polishing, no bathrooms and no kitchen.
 
those pics the streaks are so bad it's like someone just ran a disinfectant soaked cloth over the surface.

I doubt they are "clean" if you can't prepare food on that surface than it's not clean really is it.


when I clean my kitchen and bathroom I'm looking for that sparkling shine or what's the point.

it's not like it's hard to buff a surface with a microfibre cloth or whatever, it takes like 10-20seconds at the most


the mark on the cupboard door, okay I've even had that happen when I've done a really good job cleaning them but the sink and the tap is disgusting doesn't look like it was cleaned at all

hard surfaces are the easiest things to clean, if I was a cleaner I think all the dusting would be the hardest part as I'd guarantee I'd likely miss spots if I didn't live there.


personally I love cleaning, £15 per hour :O

I'd do it full time as a job if I thought I could get enough customers
 
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I'm a newbie on this forum but I have 10 years experience as a hospital domestic and I have a few carefully selected private clients.

I charge £15 per hour and a very rough rule-of-thumb that I use is 1 hour per bedroom, ie a 3 bed house should take around 3 hours. An initial clean could well take longer.

Quite frankly, those pictures are a disgrace, especially the tap. I would certainly be having words.
 
I'd personally expect someone to buff stuff clean with a microfiber cloth, the cleaners at work do that in the kitchens/mess rooms and we're a fairly industrial setting in crumbling 70's buildings.

I always have to buff up our granite worktop or it just looks rubbish so i'd expect anyone i was paying to clean it to do the same.
 
I feel like a lot of people (myself included) are willing to accept a less than perfect job, assuming the cleaner is honest, turns up on time, and doesn't charge a fortune. The woman who does our house probably does about as good a job as I would do myself, and often leaves streaks on taps, or certain areas not entirely free of dust, etc. I'm personally willing to accept that as it's still a lot cleaner than most people's houses, and I don't want to hire somebody else who may steal laptops, cash etc while we're at work. If she was leaving the house dirty, or charging a lot of money for the work, I'd talk to her, but I'm perfectly happy with the current situation.
 
geekman said:
I feel like a lot of people (myself included) are willing to accept a less than perfect job, assuming the cleaner is honest, turns up on time, and doesn't charge a fortune. The woman who does our house probably does about as good a job as I would do myself, and often leaves streaks on taps, or certain areas not entirely free of dust, etc. I'm personally willing to accept that as it's still a lot cleaner than most people's houses, and I don't want to hire somebody else who may steal laptops, cash etc while we're at work. If she was leaving the house dirty, or charging a lot of money for the work, I'd talk to her, but I'm perfectly happy with the current situation.
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I guess it depends what you really expect out of a cleaner, someone who does your only cleaning or someone who nips in a few hours a week just to "help out"
if someones leaving streaks I wouldn't be paying them 15 an hour, it's more like minimum wage surely?
 
not convinced the cupboard smears are a problem - you need to see their technique
better to wipe/clean(elbow grease) the cupboard door down with a hot soapy cloth and wipe off with a newly rinsed cloth, potentially leaving some water streaks, than
say technique you see on TV advertised one shot (bs) convenience cleaning fluids you supposedly, just leisurely wipe in one pass, on a damp, cold cloth, and wipe off on other side, pushing dirt around.

Also materials provided - (do you provide them .. wouldn't want some cloths from another house ?) may impact results ie. good quality cloths.
 
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