[Anna Warren]

Hello everyone!
I need to find a worker. I'm charging £10 per hour in domestic cleaning,I've go 6 hours available now, possibly more soon . I wanted to pay £7/h . So far, two people called me and turned down, not enough for them. Am I paying/charging  to little? What do you think? I'm  based near York.

[Richy L]

Do you mean you are officially employing them?
They probably want more than 6 hours work.

[Anna Warren]

I'm not employing them yet, but I would. Both  turned down job because of rate, not amount of hours. I know 6h is not much, will be more. I can't get more jobs myself, I'm already fully booked.

[Richy L]

I think an employed cleaner earning £7 per hour employed would be fair, when there is enough work.
I used to sub some domestic cleaning to someone so she was self employed. I charged £12 per hour and gave her £8. There was only about 8 hours of work per week. But I found it more hastle than its worth because there was such a small profit margin, and lack or work.

[Anna Warren]

Is my charge £10/h too small? I'm charging my customers that much . I'm driving quite a lot, but nearby, so I spend about £15/week  on petrol . I've always thought it's a fair rate. I'm not supplying cleaning products.

[Adam P]

£10 is too low imo for regular domestic cleans. £10.50 i'd say is minimum you should go if the work amount if worth it, however £12.00 is more realistic for small one clean a week etc jobs.

cleaning chemicals ar such a small amount of the cost that this shouldn't really effect the price. in fact i find it may up it as how can the home owner know the best products? i used to clean a house when i worked for an agency and they had the worst vacuum in the world that it took me 4 times longer to do a worse job. bring your own chemicals and equipment and you'll do a better and quicker job.

you say you do £15 petrol a week but what about wear and tear? advertising for new business? phone bills?

£7 per hour (plus then holiday?) is decent pay for a cleaner. you're on £10 and are running the busines yourself so someone on £7 who stops working as soon as they finish the job is good. the hours is what would put people off. can you give more hours to the cleaner by allowing them to work with you? i find 2 people on 1 job can also get it done quicker in the overall time.

[Anna Warren]

Thank you for replies 

[Office Cleaning Company]

Sounds a reasonable and fair rate to me.

[Anna Warren]

Is £13/h office cleaning fair rate?

[Adam P]

depends on the amount of hours. £10 is a fair rate if it's lots of hours. £13 is a terrible rate is it's only 2 hours a week. 

[dianegreenwood]

In my experience, unless you are offering someone at least 4 hours per day domestic cleaning its not really worth their while.  My girls all do 20 to 25 hours and this is a decent income but still fits in with school hours. 

Personally if I charged only £10 per hour I'd make a loss because after wages, employers NI, holiday pay, insurance, cleaning materials, mileage costs, bank charges, admin, etc even if you pay someone only £7 per hour you'll only just break even.  We pay more than that to attract great people and keep them.

For office cleaning the cost per hour to breakeven is much lower because you don't usually have so much management and admin time and cleaning materials use is lower, wages are lower and there are no mileage costs.  However you will spend time chasing the money so build this into your costs!  For office cleaning you can make a decent profit at £10 per hour for 10 hours or more per week but for most we charge at least £12.50 per hour so that holidays are built in to the cost.

Hope that helps

Diane

www.freshlymaid.co.uk

[Office Cleaning Company]

£13 p/hr imo would be a fair rate for office cleaning but there is absolutely no chance of getting anywhere near it in London & you'd be out of business in no time, all down to supply & demand as always.

[Anna Warren]

Hello!
Thank you for your responds