|
|
Equipment |
|
Whose equipment and products are used?
In all cases, your cleaning equipment and products are used
|
 |
|
Payment |
|
How is payment made?
Payment must be made in cash at the time of service being provided. Due
to the high costs of petrol, public transport, childcare etc, most housekeepers
are now paying these expenses, cash, on a daily basis
|
|
Tax Invoices |
|
What about receipts or tax invoices?
Your
cleaner always has their tax invoice book with them. All you need do is
advise your cleaner/housekeeper of your requirements as to whether you require
weekly, fortnightly or monthly tax invoices. Please do this at the commencement
of your cleaning, as it creates extra work if your requirements are only made
known, or is altered, at a later date
|
|
How Often? |
|
How often should I have my booking?
All homes have individual needs. Most homes
prefer a once per week clean. Some homes prefer a housekeeper to attend
three/four/five times a week. Some homes require someone to attend on a
fortnightly or on an ‘on call’ basis
|
|
Locations
|
|
What areas do you service? (view our
locations
page for more info)
We service most of metropolitan Melbourne.
|
|
How Quick? |
|
How
soon can my home be cleaned?
In most instances, one to three days. In areas
that are a little harder to service, it may be a week or so
|
|
Same Cleaner |
|
Will I have the same housekeeper each visit?
Yes, providing your booking is weekly or fortnightly, and obviously excepting
where your regular housekeeper is sick or goes on holiday etc. Your regular
housekeeper will get to know your home, how you like things done and will be
able to incorporate a maintenance program into your weekly cleaning i.e.
including the oven on the first week of the month, including the inside of the
fridge on the second week of the month etc, if this what you require, and
providing you allow sufficient time of course
|
|
Screening |
|
What is your screening process?
Our interviews with cleaners is a lengthy and involved process. We spend much
time listening to cleaners describe how they clean (it soon becomes clear if
they know what they're talking about!) and verifying their on-ongoing
reliability. Our screening process involves checking character/work references and/or
obtaining police checks
|
|
Access |
|
Do I have to be home when my housekeeper visits?
Not at all. Housekeepers are well
used to working in homes where the family is at home, or where everyone is out
at work and school during the day
|
|
Chores |
|
How will my housekeeper know what to do?
That's easy! We ask that you provide a detailed list of your requirements and your
cleaner will follow that list. This is the best way to ensure the clean you have
is tailored to your home and your requirements. If you keep a copy of that list,
then this will ensure any temporary or change of cleaner, can carry out the same
clean for your home
|
|
Reliability |
|
What about when my regular cleaner is sick or on holiday?
A Woman's Touch Domestic Agency will allocate a temporary cleaner/housekeeper
when your regular cleaner/housekeeper is unable to attend . The most
inconvenience you will experience will be if your booking needs to be
reallocated to an alternative day (and if that should happen, we will of course
advise you)
|
|
Minimum Hours |
|
What about minimum hours?
There is a
set minimum hours for various zones. Please advise your location and we
will be happy to advise minimum hours. A parking permit is also required
to be provided for city and inner suburb locations
|
|
How long? |
|
How long will my house take to clean? (view our
how many hours
page for more info)
We ask you to estimate the hours required. This is because each household is
different. Some homes will have an hour's worth of ironing each week; other
households will have no ironing or only ten minutes worth of ironing. Some homes will
require the washing to be put through and hung out, other homeowners say just
leave the laundry to them. Some homes will require the window ledges and
skirting boards to be wet dusted each week; other homes would say three times a
year is enough for those jobs at their place !
If your estimate is wrong, your can always adjust
the length of your booking - all you need to do is contact our office to arrange
this.
Some homes have a permanently flexible booking
i.e. 3-4 hrs per week. Some weeks the household requires 3hrs hour and other
weeks it requires 4 hours (perhaps there are stepchildren visiting on alternate
weekends)
|
|
Cancellations |
|
What do I need to do to cancel or alter my booking?
You must telephone our office to make any changes to your booking - your
housekeeper is unable to assist you with this, only our office can.
We must have advice of your cancellation or alteration (changes in length,
access etc) made to our office prior to 4pm on the business day before
your booking is due, otherwise the hours booked must be paid for in full
(the amount of hours you have booked)
Unless we have reasonable and adequate notice of
your cancellation (before 4pm on the business day prior):
-
we are unable to allocate your housekeeper
another home and the housekeeper is therefore not working but perhaps has
already paid travel and/or child care costs expecting to work
-
our
office is
turning away bookings believing we are fully booked, when your housekeeper
could be allocated to one of those
-
a great cleaner, turned away at the door of a home they're booked to
clean, or who simply arrives to find no-one is home and no key has been
left, understandably become quite disgruntled at the waste of travel expense and
time, and feels quite put out by the lack of consideration offered. A
cleaner ceasing carrying our cleans through this agency because of this creates the need for a new cleaner to
be allocated to all the other homes that cleaner was attending to; therefore
a number of people are affected and suffer loss
|
|
No
access |
|
What if I need to turn the housekeeper away at the door i.e. if
something comes up 5 minutes before the housekeeper arrives, or if I forget to
leave my key out on cleaning day?
If you need to turn your housekeeper away at the door, or forget to arrange
access on cleaning day, you will need to pay your housekeeper for the booking in
full. This is because she/he has had time and petrol/travel costs to get to your
home, may also have had to pay for child care and is unable to now work
elsewhere (which she/he normally could, if we had had the required notice)
|
|
Holidays |
|
What happens if I cancel for a few weeks, whilst I go away on holiday?
Your housekeeper is allocated to casual (one-off) bookings during your time away
and will return to you when your booking resumes (providing
you are able to provide a specific, short -term, return date)
|
|
Keys
and Alarms |
|
How does the housekeeper get access to my home?
One of three ways:
-
Someone is home to let the housekeeper in
-
A key is given to
the housekeeper to use on each visit
-
A
key is left in a hidden place each week (perhaps popped in a sock pegged on
the clothes line) and the key returned to that hidden place, or locked
inside the home after each visit
Housekeepers are well used to looking after keys and security
alarm codes
|
|
Gender/Teams |
|
Will it always be a female housekeeper, and only one person, who attends my
home?
There are both female and male housekeepers working through A Woman's Touch
Domestic Agency, although the vast majority happen to be female. Most homes are cleaned by one person,
we do have some teams on board to take care of the longer bookings (over 8
hours)
|
|
Public
Holidays |
|
What happens if my booking falls on a public holiday?
Your cleaner will offer you an alternative day for your home to be attended if
they are not going to work on that day.
A couple of weeks before any public holiday, your cleaner will discuss and
arrange this with you Please look out for your housekeeper leaving a note for you if she/he normally
does not see you. Please call our office (03 9873 5215) to arrange an
alternative day if your housekeeper should forget to leave a note
|
|
Insurance |
|
Are the cleaners insured?
Each housekeeper has public liability insurance for property damage. This
insurance cover is for working in private residential residences only, and is
for cleaners attending your home on bookings arranged via this office and with
our knowledge. No insurance cover is provided for attending any premises other
than private, residential premises, or for bookings attended without our
knowledge
|
|
Private
Cleans |
|
Can I enter into a private domestic work arrangement, at any time, with a
cleaner/housekeeper who was or is booked through A Woman's Touch Domestic
Agency?
No. It is a strict condition of using this agency that you, or anyone
acting on your behalf, does not enter into any private domestic work agreement,
with any Cleaner/Housekeeper/Party Help Person allocated to you via this agency
|
|
Contacting your cleaner |
|
How do I
contact my cleaner?
All contact must be made via our office, so that we are always in the
picture as to any temporary cancellations, change of times etc. This is so that
we get the opportunity to offer your housekeeper a temporary replacement for
your cancellation. It is also because, in our long experience, housekeepers will
understandably try to oblige you with a change of day or time but will often
forget to advise other clients who may be affected by such changes
|
|
Training |
|
Do I need to offer training/guidance to my housekeeper?
In reality, we find every home needs to provide the housekeeper
(despite their experience) with information
as to what is expected in that particular home. Housekeepers attend a
number of homes in the average week and find each home has different
requirements. Each housekeeper needs the advantage of knowing what you consider
to be part of your weekly clean, as your expectations and requirements is likely
to differ from other clients. Communication is the way to avoid unnecessary
problems
|
|
Dissatisfaction with Clean |
|
What do I do
if I am unhappy with the clean?
The best way to avoid being unhappy with your clean is to:
(a) communicate well with the cleaner as to your
requirements;
(b) check the work on completion and ask
the cleaner to rectify any problem then and there;
(c) be realistic about how much can be done in
each hour, in case you have not booked enough hours
Please be assured that any problem reported to our agency is
investigated so that the appropriate decision is made on how best to resolve it
|
