Thanks for the feedback guys. It sounds like my quote was there or thereabouts and, if it was high, it wasn't much over. Paul W. I was basing quotes on about £15 - £20 per hour until a couple of years back but I felt I was shortchanging myself. Nothing wrong with it though if that's the going rate for the area and you can live OK on it. Mind you, I'm uneasy about charging a higher rate for cheque payments because that could give the impression of non declaration - something that I don't do.
My hunch is that if I was quoting directly for the customer I might well have got this job but the fact that I may not have left sufficient for a cleaning company's margin may have been the deciding factor in not getting it. There probably is room for maneouvre on the frequency though. Maybe the outside of the showroom weekly, inside two weekly, and the small office (not part of the above) maybe monthly. Maybe I could even haved shaved a tenner a week off the price without dropping the frequency but I suppose it's about how far am I prepared to go. I'm not desperate for work but these are the sort of jobs I want to start moving into.
Anyway, I haven't lost it because I never had it.