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House Cleaning Services

© Maureen Fleury

We all know that housework takes out a big chunk of our time at home. I know I have many reservations about hiring a house cleaning service. Mainly it's the money and being distrustful of strangers in my house. Many of my co-workers use cleaning services and I may consider it in the near future. By sharing some ideas I found in discussion a forum on the Internet, That Home Site perhaps I will feel more comfortable and maybe you will too.

Here are the highlights of the points of view from a homeowner and a cleaning service owner perspective.

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Homeowner:

I used **** Maids once to get the house clean after it had been neglected awhile and they were OK but not as good as the cleaning lady I hired after that. Their crew didn't work particularly hard or quickly and didn't seem to know how to clean the right way---I caught two of them just before they started to mop wood floors with a bucket of sudsy water! They did pretty much everything my private cleaning lady did---dust, vacuum, clean kitchen cabinet fronts, kitchen counters, sink & stovetop, mopped the kitchen floor, and cleaned all the bathrooms thoroughly.

I can't remember if they changed the sheets on the bed. Maybe. My regular lady didn't do that. They didn't do laundry and I wouldn't have trusted them to do it right so that was OK. They didn't wash windows but neither did my cleaning lady---around here it seems that you hire a window-washer to do that. Bonded and insured is good but there can still be theft, of course. It's way better than no insurance, though.

I'd call a few places and tell them what you want done and get estimates. They are generally quite a bit higher around here than private cleaning ladies since the owner of the business takes a cut and still has to pay his or her crews who do the actual cleaning. But they are generally easier to find than a good private cleaning lady, so I guess that's what you're paying for----the convenience and availability. I wouldn't use them regularly but for a one-time-only thing, they're OK.

Bonding is great if your cleaners are charged and convicted of theft. Otherwise the bonding company won't pay off. It's not easy to convict a thief unless they are caught red handed in which case you won't need reimbursement because the goods are recoverable. I suppose bonding would work in a check theft case with photographic evidence from the bank. I have a cleaning company and won't get the bonding until I have to for a bank building or condo building or something. The insurance is a must have ,however.The best solution is to keep the valubles locked up in a room they don't have access to. Make sure to run a criminal background check on whoever you hire. Check the references and remember that someone who has 50 or more is probobly not fibbing, and someone who only has 1 or 2 may have their mother on the other end of the phone when you call. A small reputable firm where the owner is still involved in the cleaning is your best bet...............