Paying cleaner

Ill go for £35. Thanks for all the advice.

I live in London, where cleaners are two a penny. I pay mine £15 an hour for three hours weekly, but some who are desperate are working for below the minimum wage of £12.21.

Many of these girls are taken advantage of, and some request a cleaner, stating they can only afford £10 an hour. My reply is to do it yourself. One man is offering his services for £6 an hour. I feel he must live in a garage with 10 others.

Wyllow3

I pay my cleaner £17.50 an hour, and will put it up as the cost of living rises. She generally charges £15, but since she started 3 years ago the cost of living has gone up a lot. I would be ashamed to try and pay less than I feel an invaluable job like hers is worth.

I'm really lucky - she loves cleaning. she even loves valeting the car (yes really, really). Making everything tidy and clean and neat.

Mind you, it's a happy unpredicted situation. We have a laugh and share a lot too, ie we just get on naturally. Give each other a good listening if needed, never mind the cleaning.

No shortage of cleaners in my large northern city. and some who will work for shocking low wages, I pay more than the gym does. I have her every week as its great to set to together to do more than cleaning - a bit of sandpaper and touch up some paintwork together? Share tips on cleaning products?

But I am, very, very fortunate indeed. I trust her, if she sees personal stuff I dont mind - she is open about her life.

My female gardener charges £22 an hour and we set to together, I do the light bits and bobs as much as possible.

Cleans your car, She really does go the extra mile ☺️

I pay my cleaner £40 for two hours and my Gardener £50 for two hours. They also get free jars of honey and presents at Christmas.

Out of interest, do any of you get your cleaners through a professional cleaning company or do you just go by recommendations from neighbours or friends?

I ask because it’s a job which requires a lot of trust on the part of the home owner, especially if the cleaner is in the house alone.

Perhaps £40 for 2 hours.

Christmas, Easter and Holidays should, imo, be paid as well.

JenniferEccles

Out of interest, do any of you get your cleaners through a professional cleaning company or do you just go by recommendations from neighbours or friends?

I ask because it’s a job which requires a lot of trust on the part of the home owner, especially if the cleaner is in the house alone.

For a year or so we used a professional cleaning company. This was after Covid when cleaners were like gold dust. They came in 2s and 3s and were very expensive. Some were brilliant others weren’t. It was good when we were able to hire a local lady.

We had a brilliant cleaner where we used to live in West London, bit of a cliche, but she was Polish, at one time there were a multitude of cards coming through the door from fairly newly arrived Eastern Europeans and my husband made the decision to call one, given he does most of the heavy duty cleaning showers etc. Agneta, I think that's how she spelt her name came through a middle woman, who took a cut and eventually she got rid of her, not before that agent tried to pressurise us into not keeping her on, but we were having none of it. She was with us for a few years, she went from hardly speaking any English to practically fluent in that time. We paid her when she couldn't visit through the pandemic, not everyone did. We always gave her extra money at Christmas plus a little gift and she made us Polish cakes and gave us something small too. When we moved she gave us a set of coffee cups which we use every day a perfect size for our first coffee of the day. We're thinking of getting a cleaner where we are now, but I'm not sure how easy that will be those cards don't come through the door anymore. I don't want anyone like MollyMaid who were prolific in the area where we used to live, they cleaned a flat for one of our sons and girlfriend when they moved out to buy their house, and they were rubbish, given it was a modern empty flat, no furniture to negotiate round, they didn't do a good job at all, and there were two of them.