[Clean Cloth]

As a traditional window cleaner I find that quite a few of my customers have plant pots, benches and other obstacle in front of their windows making access to clean them a bit awkward at best or impossible at worst. I try to lean over the ones I can but I do need to move some huge pots, pallets, gas cylinders etc to clean the windows.

I was wondering how this affects the WFP workers, do you find the hose keeps getting caught up on the stuff in front of the windows?

[NWH]

You get used to knowing where the hose is and where it’s going behind you you almost adapt radar when you know the jobs well enough,what I don’t miss about traditional is getting wet this time of the year and months ahead leaning over wet plants and bushes first thing in the morning and never really drying out over the day.

[zesty]

The hose gets caught no matter what, some people’s side gate access paths are littered with hose loving obstacles.

The hose just loves to get caught on things, you end up getting frustrated  with things like garden gnomes and stupid garden decoration things.

Sometimes you get so annoyed you spend minutes trying to unhook it, by flicking the hose, it becomes a game of stubbornness. You could of course just walk 5 yards and unhook it, but that would be defeat. 

In all seriousness, it’s supsringly rare, it does happen a few times a day, but on the whole you get to know the jobs, you start to learn where to pull the hose and at what angle.

[james peters]

I live in wales , and i am visiting my brother in ireland.    I am  a little bit pEed, so I apologise in advance.
I have been in this game for 30 years.
at one point I realised that there were good easy jobs and not so easy jobs . then i realised I only wanted the easy jobs .
thats the beauty of this job . we can pick and choose what we do .
plant pots are a NO NO 

[Simon Trapani]

Yep. Anything too difficult is dumped or not taken on in the first place. Been going 29 years, don’t need those jobs in my life.

[dazmond]

As a traditional window cleaner I find that quite a few of my customers have plant pots, benches and other obstacle in front of their windows making access to clean them a bit awkward at best or impossible at worst. I try to lean over the ones I can but I do need to move some huge pots, pallets, gas cylinders etc to clean the windows.

I was wondering how this affects the WFP workers, do you find the hose keeps getting caught up on the stuff in front of the windows?

It's much easier using wfp as I can clean ground floor windows from 10 ft away if need be so I'm not having to wrestle with a bush,bench or plant pots,etc...

[dazmond]

I live in wales , and i am visiting my brother in ireland.    I am  a little bit pEed, so I apologise in advance.
I have been in this game for 30 years.
at one point I realised that there were good easy jobs and not so easy jobs . then i realised I only wanted the easy jobs .
thats the beauty of this job . we can pick and choose what we do .
plant pots are a NO NO 

I'd have hardly any work if I only took on houses with no plant pots....

Only wanting easy jobs is not realistic in this day and age....lots of joe public have conservatories,kitchen/side extensions,glass extensions built onto their properties over time....

[Granny]

Don't forget all the Solar trinkets placed strategically, exactly where they will catch on the hose, most of them with flimsy plastic stems and fragile glass globes on top.

[NWH]

Yeah I’ve done one of them a few years back

[p1w1]

Don't forget all the Solar trinkets placed strategically, exactly where they will catch on the hose, most of them with flimsy plastic stems and fragile glass globes on top.

My Mrs covered our garden with them, they made great air rifle targets 

[james peters]

I live in wales , and i am visiting my brother in ireland.    I am  a little bit pEed, so I apologise in advance.
I have been in this game for 30 years.
at one point I realised that there were good easy jobs and not so easy jobs . then i realised I only wanted the easy jobs .
thats the beauty of this job . we can pick and choose what we do .
plant pots are a NO NO 

I'd have hardly any work if I only took on houses with no plant pots....

Only wanting easy jobs is not realistic in this day and age....lots of joe public have conservatories,kitchen/side extensions,glass extensions built onto their properties over time....

yes , I agree, but there are houses with plant pots , then there are houses like a garden centre 

[JandS]

"Sometimes you get so annoyed you spend minutes trying to unhook it, by flicking the hose, it becomes a game of stubbornness. You could of course just walk 5 yards and unhook it, but that would be defeat"

That's me all day long.....and after wasting 30 seconds ping about you end up walking the 5 yards anyway....that feeling when you've dragged nearly enough down the drive  for the backs and then it snags under the drive pillar but you think it will just about reach anyway.......extend pole and it's inches short and you have to walk all the way back again.

[zesty]

"Sometimes you get so annoyed you spend minutes trying to unhook it, by flicking the hose, it becomes a game of stubbornness. You could of course just walk 5 yards and unhook it, but that would be defeat"

That's me all day long.....and after wasting 30 seconds ping about you end up walking the 5 yards anyway....that feeling when you've dragged nearly enough down the drive  for the backs and then it snags under the drive pillar but you think it will just about reach anyway.......extend pole and it's inches short and you have to walk all the way back again.

It is a real annoyance!

Car tyres are the worst as well.

The sound of a watering can being dragged along the side passage is another familiar one.

Snagging hose is basically the only real nuisance of window cleaning though, so it’s tolerable!

There is the rare time, where you tug the hose so hard you rip out a small shrub or similar  - usually only when you’re having ‘one of those days’ 

[james peters]

I refuse to clamber over anything these days .
A few years ago I tripped over a refuse  bag , when I got up I knew I was badly hurt.
my shoulder was hanging out of its socket. morphine , gas and air and 3 doctors to get it back in . 
the customer knew what had happened .
2 months later, I called to clean , and hey presto , bins along the access way again. and she knew I was calling that day.
I just drove off. 

[the king]

I got so frustrated once i had my extreme pole extended I yanked the hose so hard i jolted and snapped my pole ;😬

[M & C Window Cleaning]

The range of things my hose has snagged on is truly amazing.
Uneven pavement, joints in decking, slightly raised drains or inspection covers, weeds, gate latches, tops and bottoms of fencing, gaps in curb stones, bikes, washing line poles, car tyres and all manner of garden ornaments. I’ve lost count of the number of solar powered lights I’ve broken this way. It’s a miracle I get any work done at times.
One that always makes me laugh, and others too when they see me do it, is when I manage work around a bush, washing line pole or lamppost and forget to go back the way I came from hence looping my hose around the  object and then being pulled up hard when I go to walk off.

[dazmond]

I've noticed  some customers have more 'stuff' in their gardens..I think during lockdown lots of people have been spending more on their gardens...some are just untidy people and I hate it because I'm a neat and tidy person...I can't believe some people live in such a cluttered messy way....