[qginsburg]

Is
It just me or are end of tenancy cleaning jobs hard work and full of complaints ?
I'm probably doing them wrong but im really struggling to have a consistently.
whats your two pence ?

[Simon Gerrard]

Depends what you are doing them with?

Simon

[wayne zabel]

I mainly find EOT jobs pretty easy as most of them are cheapo PP that are a dream to clean.

I do some EOT wool carpets but rarely and the letting agent understands the problems found when doing such jobs and is happy that I do my best.

[William Sharpe]

EOT work is normally pretty forward stuff if you pay attention to edges, under doors inside cupboards (if carpeted) always move the bed and furniture especially the wardrobes. Always find out from the landlord or Agent if any workman are due to carry out any jobs after you leave as they have no problem in messing up your nice clean (damp carpets) Insist on being the last contractor.

[derek west]

love EOT's. no furniture to move, no watchful eye over your shoulder and cos i know its EOT i pick up a coffee from maccies, much nicer than customer instant.

they make some great before and after pictures too.

plus if you've got the right kit you can be in and out in no time at all.

full 3 bed EOT, if i go over 90 minutes i'm disappointed. but occasionally i do. make up slows me down, must stop re applying it while on the job

[Mike Halliday]

WARNING MAJOR RANT ALERT!!

Who are you dealing with the letting agent or the tenant?  We don't work for letting agents so we usually have an easy time of EOTs cleaning. I think the key to successful EOT is to educate the tenant about what to expect form the letting agent so rather than just accept when they say "the carpets were not cleaned to our satisfaction" they can retaliate with "how old are the carpets?" Or "where they professionally cleaned before we moved in?"

Letting agents secretary's are the most stuck up obnoxious people going, they talk pooe and seem to think that the tenants are lowly scum who rent because they can't afford to buy. The tenant is paying me for my professional services which I think includes my expert knowledge on letting agents,

 I always ask before I start "what condition were the carpets in when you moved in?" The amount of times I told they were in terrible dirty condition but now the agents wants the to look brand new

The agent must allow for normal wear & tear they cannot  expect  the carpets to be in the same condition of when the tenant moved in.

[qginsburg]

All
Good points , I dropped into every letting agent within 50 miles of my town to introduce myself.
What I found is that most of them want a full eot clean meaning the house as well as the carpets
as business was a little slow I agreed to do some , what I do is hire a couple of cleaners while I do the carpets. Its not the best but at least its work. I think I will transition out of them in all honesty.
The work is boring , unlike carpet cleaning 

[William Sharpe]

Full house cleaning is ok when fully costed out and a reasonable profit to be made.  here is a breakdown on a 3 bedroom house deep clean:-

Average charge 280.00

6hrs @ 8.00 to a local cleaner = 48.00
Oven & extractor 60.00 to oven cleaner
22.00 to external window cleaner............................................. Total 130.00
Lastly carpets done by self approx 1 to 1 and a half hrs ..........         150.00

any garbage or rubbish to be removed is charged for as an extra

A good revenue generator Always do a full written quote with noted issues

Reg

[Neil Jones]

William you aren't making any money there though, apart from the carpets. Why would you bother messing with the rest of it just to provide someone also with a wage?
I'd add 20-30% on to all the prices apart from carpets and maybe ovens because my oven cleaner does me a deal on mine.

[Neil Jones]

Plus it covers the cost of consumables.

[qginsburg]

Nice advice , the thing of it is there is only a set price the market will pay for such work.
I actually do the ovens myself to increase revenue , maybe thats where i going wrong
I also do the windows myself and am able to garner a bit more cash by doing so.
Thanks for sharing how you manage your projects.

[Craigp]

I agree completely Mike H.

I only do tenants these days.

Recently I did a full house for a young lady (moving out tenant) all happy and paid me.

One week later the letting agents called, REALLY snotty attitude saying "To be honest they don't look like they been cleaned, we are not happy, please go back a re clean"

I said "I don't know what your talking about they came up great, I'm happy to go back but only if MY customer Mrs xxx wants me too. Ill call her now"


So I called my customer and asked if everything was ok with the job and she said, "nope I don't want you to go back you did a great job, we was very pleased, sorry they called you, the letting agents have been basta*ds all along, leave it with me" (we had a longer chat really about what as*holes letting agents are  )

Letting agents treat tenants like sh*t, they'll treat carpet cleaners the same if you let them, I'm happy I don't work for them anymore.

[David MK Cleaning]

I work for a few agents doing EOT's and I find the best way to solve any problems that might occur is to take before and after pictures of pretty much every square inch of carpet, paying particulars to burns marks or other marks like these.

I find this covers myself especially if you tell the agents that you will take photo's of the work carried out, then they know they cant mess you around.

Only ever had 1 query, i e-mailed the relevant photo's and they backed off.

I think play it safe and document everything.
1 downside is you need a bloody big hardrive to save all the photo's lol

[Darran Pryce]

We always make money on EOT cleans.  One main factor is to price the carpets separately in your quote.  Explain the oven alone is £50 (for a single oven)  We charge £250 for a deep EOT, as that is what we specialise in.  Were not Molly Maid with a duster and Mr Sheen.  If custy wants carpets I always give them discount as were on the job anyway.

My average price for EOT clean is £250 + £60 for up to 5 carpets.  Some large detached houses we have charged £360 for a 5 bed.  I use one man per house, unless its student property with 8 rooms, 3 bathrooms and one large Kitchen, then we charge £350 day rate (if skip is needed that's billed extra).  Carpets billed extra, prices £20 bedroom, £30 living room that's with discount for the tenants/landlord/letting agent. 

Property maintenance is priced per job/requirements with a minimum call out of £40.   

[Mike Halliday]

I think you need to realise that  the EOT market covers a wide spectrum of properties from crappy bedsits to upmarket manor houses, one of ours before Xmas  was a 8 bed house. It was originally was 2 separate town houses knocked into one.

The letting agent had taken a 2 month deposit and left a 3 page checklist of how the property was to be left when they vacated, including the cutting of the grass on the lawn and the cleaning of all windows. The woman told me the grass was knee high when they moved in, when she mentioned it the woman at the agent said it had been cut when the previous tenants had moved out so she could explain why it was in such a state (obviously too thick to realise grass grows   )

We charged £380 to clean the carpets which included a 20% discount we give for empty properties

30% was just vacuumed 35% bonneted  & 35% HWE (mainly the first set of stairs, hallway and lounge)

[Steve Chapman]

Mike, are you saying you charged for the carpets to be professionally cleaned and then just vacuumed some of them ?

[Doug Holloway]

Hi Guys

It's about being selective with letting agents, I have one really professional one and another two quite good ones which I do work for, the spivs I leave to someone else.

Cheers

Doug

[Mike Halliday]

Mike, are you saying you charged for the carpets to be professionally cleaned and then just vacuumed some of them ?

Our job is to remove the dirt, as professionals it is up to us to use our knowledge to chose how we do this. Why HWE if we can remove the dirt with a vacuum, these carpets we vacuumed would have looked no better if we had HWEed them so why  give the customer the hassle of damp carpets? Same as the carpets we  bonneted.... that's all they needed

[Darran Pryce]

Personally if the carpet is down for cleaning after the the end of tenancy clean, we would clean them (vac then deep clean) they have paid for it, even if the carpets look like they don't need it after the Vac.  

If they had a hidden cam and seen what they should be getting and not for their money and what was originally down for getting done, that would ruin your rep.  Not worth it in my eyes.

If there paying for carpets deep cleaning then that's what they will get whether or it needs it after the initial vac.  I have rung the landlord/agent up and mentioned to them the carpets don't need cleaning as they have come up great just with a vac, so its up to you if you want me to clean them... 9/10 say clean them!

[Steve Chapman]

"Our job is to remove the dirt, as professionals it is up to us to use our knowledge to chose how we do this. Why HWE if we can remove the dirt with a vacuum, these carpets we vacuumed would have looked no better if we had HWEed them so why  give the customer the hassle of damp carpets? Same as the carpets we  bonneted.... that's all they needed"



imho if you are asked to professionally clean the carpets and you charge for it then you should do it whether it needs it or not, most people can vacuum a carpet themselves, but they want the satisfaction of knowing they've been properly cleaned !

I think most agents would be horrified if they thought I'd just gone and vacuumed the carpets 

Surely we are being paid to do what's asked of us not what we decide is necessary !


Steve