I can't believe this!

[Pages Personal Cleaning]

I have had this client for years now and she constantly kept forgetting to leave payment for her home cleaning. I have discussed this with her more than once in the past and it clearly states in my policy that payment is due at time of service and if payment is not left I will call for a credit card. If the client can't be reached they have to reschedule. The other day we went to clean and payment was not there again. I tried to call her at work twice for payment. I left a message that she would need to reschedule. She called me and said because we didn't go ahead and clean anyway even though no payment was left that she no longer wanted our services.
I think this is totally ridiculous.
Patti

[Pages Personal Cleaning]

By the way, I called her back and said that was ok because I would rather have clients that pay anyway.
Patti

[Grizzly]

Patti: This is a client that you don't need. There are lots of more responsible ones in the ocean.

Bill

[Roman Cleaning Services]

thats crazy. she paid, right?

[Pages Personal Cleaning]

No. She didn't pay. She expected us to do the cleaning anyway and collect later. And Bill your right, we have plenty of good paying customers and we don't need or want customers like this.
Patti

[logan5127]

I have one large office cleaning job that pays $600 a week. We are to be paid on following Tuesday after each week of cleaning is done. The check comes from a corporate office out of state but is always there. At one time checks didn't come and they said it was something to do with corporate re organizing. It went 5 weeks without a check and It was starting to look serious. The corporate office kept saying it would be straightened out soon. Finally I got a check for the full 5 weeks. What a relief. I was fortunate to be able to keep paying employees and hang in there. I clear around $850 a month on this job.I know this is bigger than a house and losing one house may not be that big a deal. But to someone just starting out with only 3 or 4 houses it is huge. My advice here is try to have as good of a relation with your clients as possible. If you know them well enough you will know what their intentions are. If they don't leave a check and you know them well enough you can come to a conclusion that they will or that they are not going to pay at all.. If you know that it will be there next week then don't walk away unless you have lots more to do. Call them and ask nicely if you can pick it up or say , I'm sorry to bother you, I know your busy but I thank you forgot to leave the check. Then find out what intentions are. If you can't reach them , this is why you need to know your customers well so that you can determine if you will be paid anyway. If $75 is going to put to much strain on your budget than perhaps you could start an emergency cookie jar and put $75 in it just in case this check does not come in that week and you will have it to fall back on. Again I say this more to the newbies than to the veterans. If I walked away everytime a check was not left when it was suppose to have been I would have lost a lot of money over the years. In 24 years I have only not been paid $50 and that was a customer that skipped town over night. Lets say you have a house you are cleaning for $75 and you walk away because the check was not there. What have you walked away from. $75 for every cleaning that was to be done from that moment on plus a referal being good to one that is now bad. Lets say you did the job and was not paid. You may have lost the same thing but you did all you could do and the customer can't say she let you go because you didn't do the job. The best case is that you did the job and you still got paid but maybe a week or so later. You still have the job; a happy customer and hopefully more referals to come. So don't get upset to fast, try to know your customer well, and always be prepared that you can not always count on every check being there every week. Thats just my thoughts and way of doing business. Does not mean that it is the best way , right way or wrong way but it works for me.

[kimmierue]

Yeah, I think that decision comes from just being frustrated with the woman. I can understand, if she repeatedly forgets to leave the check obviously she doesn't take it as seriously as she should and as much as she takes her clean house. Sounds like you didn't have a good relationship with her anyways. Not a big loss then.

I have a little forgiveness in my payment at time of service policy, depending on my customer like Dan said.

[Pages Personal Cleaning]

Yes it is good advise for someone just starting out, but you have to understand I have been cleaning for this woman for about 3 years and this has happened too many times. And I also call her the day before each cleaning to remind her. She will leave the garbage out for us to empty but won't leave a check. Its not a case of I just forgot. Sometimes you just have to say enough. There are too many good paying customers out there to put up with people like this.
Also, you have to have policies and stick with them.
Patti

[kimmierue]

Oh wow. You mean you call the lady the night before and remind her and she still doesn't leave a check?!? That's nuts!

Yeah, that's what I was trying to say in my post...that there had to be more to the story then just her forgetting to leave the check.

I don't blame you one bit. I would have done the same thing.

[shiny]

I can see a client forgeting to leave a check one time, but if it were to become a habit its time to find a new client. I think if the check wasn't there the second or third time I wouldn't give my services, but thats just me. Perhaps you could add a stipulation in your contract that if payment is not left, then services will not be rendered.