What to Expect with Regular Home Cleaning Services
This is the year you finally decided to spend more quality time with your family; time that doesn’t involve a mop, broom, or scrub brush. That’s right - this is the year you are taking back this valuable time by hiring a home cleaning service. Someone else can clean so you don’t have to.
Now, the only thing that’s left is to understand how often you want your cleaners to come in and what will be cleaned when they’re there. That’s what we’re here to help with today, providing clarity on what to expect when you work with a professional cleaning company. Let’s dive in!
When you receive regular cleaning services, you typically invest in weekly or biweekly cleaning. If you’re looking for a monthly clean, this is considered a deep clean as it often takes more time to complete. One reason is that with weekly/biweekly cleaning, we’re able to rotate what is cleaned each time, whereby a monthly cleaning requires everything to be cleaned in one fell swoop.
Once we determine which service it is you’re looking for, we schedule our initial cleaning visit. This visit is typically a deep clean as the first clean almost always takes a bit longer for a few reasons:
We’re getting used to the overall layout of the house.
We’re creating a clean slate so we’re all on the same page as to what “clean” is. Every so often, we walk into a home to learn that the house isn’t quite ready for a simple regular clean.
We set up our working relationship, learning your expectations and how we can best meet them.
After the initial deep clean visit, we begin our weekly/biweekly regular services. What follows is a breakdown of what your investment includes.
Bathrooms
As one of the least clean spaces in your home (sorry - it’s true), we always clean the bathroom. This includes scrubbing the toilets, sinks, showers and tubs, along with a wipe down of the baseboards, walls and cabinets.
If weekly, we do a full cleaning of the outsides of the walls and cabinets every second time we are in there (e.g., weeks 1 and 3). For biweekly, this is done each time.
Kitchen
A standard kitchen cleaning involves washing counters and stove tops, and wiping down the outside of the oven, dishwasher, and fridge, along with the inside and outside of the microwave. On the counters, we make sure to lift and clean underneath items (e.g., coffee machine, knife blocks, etc.). Note that the less there is on the counter for us to clean around, the more time we’re able to save, which allows you to save money because we do not have to work around as many objects.
What is not included is doing the dishes - unless specifically requested. If the sink is full of dishes, we are unable to do the work you hired us for. We will most likely put them in the dishwasher but note that this will be added as an additional service.
Every fourth week (or every second time for biweekly cleans), we do a complete wipe down of the cabinets.
If you require us to clean inside things, such as the inside of the fridge, oven, cabinets, or drawers, this does add extra time. Depending on what this special request is will determine how this influences your budget. These extra request cleanings are completed only at your discretion and request.
Dusting
This is where we often have a miscommunication in expectations with clients. While we do a basic dusting each time we’re there, we do not dust everything. This includes high-cleaning items (items above the cabinets, tops of shelves, etc.), door frames, baseboards, and so forth. These are dusted on a rotating schedule, typically done every fourth week for weekly cleaning, and every second time for biweekly.
Floors
Your floors deserve TLC every single time we’re there. This is why we always do a thorough vacuum and mop (in the rooms you ask us to). A few things to note about this:
If we’re able to easily reach our vacuums/mops under your furniture, then we’ll be able to clean underneath them.
If you would like us to clean underneath your furniture, we ask that you move it as we typically do not move furniture, particularly on floors, to avoid scratching your flooring material. This also requires a bit extra time; therefore, we ask to schedule this in advance of the regular cleaning.
We do vacuum fabric furniture (e.g., sofas). However, if it is a huge sectional, this can take 30+ minutes, especially if there is a lot of animal hair involved. If you need us to vacuum this item, we ask that you book extra time.
Common Bits and Pieces
There are three items that we’re often asked about: bedding, garbage, and the “little things”.
Changing bedsheets - this is a special request that you must make in advance. We ask that you leave the clean sheets on the bed you’d like us to put them on. However, we do not launder them as there are often personal preferences when it comes to doing the laundry.
Taking out the garbage - we collect and take this out each and every time. However, we leave the compost and recycling up to the customer as people have preferences as to how they like to sort these items.
“Little things” - we do our best to clean what we can in the amount of time you’ve booked. Sometimes we’re able to squeeze in those little extras (e.g., wiping your dog’s nose art off the inside of your front window). However, all these “little things” quickly add up to a half hour or more. This is why we prefer to work on a rotating schedule when it comes to weekly/biweekly regular cleaning services. All we ask is to remember that while we are always happy to help clean your home, we are still a business, and our cleaners deserve to be paid for their time. Be clear with your expectations and we can ensure we are able to meet them within the right amount of dedicated time.
If you still have questions as to what you should look for beyond, “what’s included in a regular clean,” please read this blog for common questions we hear when scheduling new clients.
One Final Note
Cleaners do not come in to tidy up. We come to clean your home. This is easier when clothes are put away, dishes are in the dishwasher (not in the sink), and toys are tucked away instead of scattered on the floor. This way, we can do what we do best - make your home sparkle and give you more time with the people you want to spend time with.
To inquire about our services or to book an initial quote, connect with us today.