1st Job Done... 150ltrs and 3 hours : )

[steve garwood]

I honestly think people make to much of a big deal on first cleans.

In the 11 years that I’ve been using WFP, I’ve just told the customer that there might be the odd speck here and there on the first clean.

I charge them double and clean them twice without using any chemicals, ladders, customers tap etc etc.

Never had a single issue 

 

[wezza13]

I honestly think people make to much of a big deal on first cleans.

In the 11 years that I’ve been using WFP, I’ve just told the customer that there might be the odd speck here and there on the first clean.

I charge them double and clean them twice without using any chemicals, ladders, customers tap etc etc.

Never had a single issue 

Totally agree.

Double the price for a first clean. Only ever had one customer question the price, so knocked a tenner off for her and she was happy.

I'd always recommend charging double. It takes you at least double the time and the customers will judge how good you are (and whether they would like you to continue) on that first clean, so make every effort to leave it in the best condition that you can.

Double the price (usually) covers this.

 

[Stevieboy]

I honestly think people make to much of a big deal on first cleans.

In the 11 years that I’ve been using WFP, I’ve just told the customer that there might be the odd speck here and there on the first clean.

I charge them double and clean them twice without using any chemicals, ladders, customers tap etc etc.

Never had a single issue 

I nearly totally agree. Apart from always use the tap if there is one  why waste pure if you don’t have to???

 

[Chris34]

I've just been doing a cash flow forecast for the next 6 months.  For the first 3 months the majority of the money comes from first cleans, after that then the regular clean income exceeds the first clean income.  So to keep my head above the water I haven't got the luxury of giving a regular price for the first clean, they have to be double or nearly double to make it viable.  After 6 months then the picture looks a lot more rosy but to begin with it's a real eye opener / wake up call.

I've set my drop off rate at 10% per month (1 in 10 cancel) does this sound ok?

 

[Iron Giant]

First cleans using clients tap and cleaning with tap water is a no-no in my books doesn't look professional at all and for what pure costs to make you might save yourself a £0.50 using tap water ?, I have done a few quotes this past week and not got one with a double charge for a first  clean thinking some are watching the pennies at this time of year ?

 

[steve garwood]

First cleans using clients tap and cleaning with tap water is a no-no in my books doesn't look professional at all and for what pure costs to make you might save yourself a £0.50 using tap water ?, I have done a few quotes this past week and not got one with a double charge for a first  clean thinking some are watching the pennies at this time of year ?

Plus if it’s a sunny day, there’s a chance the tap water will start to dry leaving limescale spots

 

[Iron Giant]

Plus if it’s a sunny day, there’s a chance the tap water will start to dry leaving limescale spots

Never thought of that with living in a soft water area, but yes totally agree then someone would be getting up a ladder and applying Vikal shifting limescale and the conclusion is to use pure water ?

 

[Stevieboy]

I think it’s just called changing your working method to suit conditions. ?

 

[Davy G]

For first cleans, I weigh up the house and especially the customer carefully. If the house is filthy, and, or, I feel that the customer is unlikely to stay a regular, I will charge extra, but never double as I don't think I would have as many customers if I did. If the house isn't too bad or I get a good feeling about the customer, I might charge a little more but not much more than a maintenance wash. Example : if I assess the price will be £20, 6 weekly, I might charge an extra £5-£10, or, no extra, depending on my initial assessment. No ladders, cloths, hand brushes, or tap water will be used. At the most and only if it's really bad, a squirt of soapmix on the brush. Spread it quickly on the top wìndows and lather it well in with a tiny squirt of water mixed in. The dirtier it looks at this stage the better for the customer to see. Same with the downstairs. Leave it no longer than a couple of minutes. Then normal wash, starting again on the top of course, with a little more elbow grease and water than a maintenance wash to get it thoroughly clean. The few minutes with filthy soapy wìndows really impresses the customers. I wouldn't stay there titivating it any longer than necessary. Get it done collect the payment and move on.

I cannot emphasis enough the need for speed as well as quality if we want to thrive. Do the sums, an extra £15 job fitted in each day on a five day week=£75. Then times 4 odd working weeks in a month =£600. Times 10 months, taking into account, holidays, weather etc =£6000 by my estimate. Now think, not one but 2 extra houses a day =£1200. Don't mess about, get stuck in. Do it quick, do it right, and move on. Not trying to lecture. Just want to help people earn what they should for their hard work, without it being harder than necessary. ?

 

[Incheck]

The whole sill flushing business is easily avoided. All the little specs that endlessley flush out will never dissapear by just flushing. My solution is screwfix microfibre cloths. (Blue ones you can buy them in bulk)  Leave all the specs on the sills, carry on cleaning, & then at the end quickly wipe over each sill with a dry micro fibre cloth job done. Much less time and pure water being wasted ? Work trousers have many pockets, i utilize them by stuffing them to the brim with microfibre cloths and magic sponges. That way you havent got to keep running to the van every time you need these little items

 

[Iron Giant]

I use old towels cut up as sill cloths as needed and wipe around doorways if the clients home and is a cash payer which I also use to wipe pole hose I am old school after almost 19 years old towels work best plus I carry a bronze wool pad and a magic sponge in my Moerman side kit pouch along with calling cards and a pen, I really don't get the new school of microfibers or no cloth's at all a guy I know uses CLX's and never wipes the pole hose until he gets back to the van 

 

[Nathansmyth1991]

Yeah I'm very aware of that and definitely don't want to be cheap.  I've set my target at £35 to £40 per hour which is a hell of a lot more than the minimum wage I get at some of the work I do at the moment.  

With regard to the first clean, well I was thinking about it last night, this house would have to be about a £20 house for a 30 minute 4 week clean, my first clean price would have been quoted at £25.  If I had charged £40 maybe £50 for the first clean then I really don't think they would have agreed a clean.  I'm thinking that the first clean needs to be discounted in order to get them on board and then it would be a case of you win some you lose some.  

If the regular clean price would be £20 what would everybody else charge for the first clean price?  It is a hell of a lot of work compared to say cleaning it again in 4 weeks, I can see it's a bit of a ball ache .  I can imagine the regular cleaning being a lot faster, I'm going to clean my parents again to see how it compares.

Thanks again for the advice guys, now it's back out to the low paid stuff, hopefully not for too much longer  : )

I charge 1.5 x the normal price for a first clean and just explain the reason we charge this is because it takes a lot longer Cleaning all their frames doors sills and glass. We charge this so we can afford to take the time and make the first clean 100 percent. No issues as of yet 

 

[Incheck]

I’m one of the few that makes a big deal of first cleans. We Charge good money for them although we don’t do them in particularly high volume as many are put off by the price. When we built our rounds we did it the hard way by not charging extra for first cleans. It was painful but thats what got us there. 

Now we charge what should be charged for them. Magic sponges and pink stuff come out to restore sills and doors wherever possible as i now include the restoration work as part of the first clean. Gives a very good impression to the customer and earns you wedge rather than £10 here, £15 there, etc etc. a lot of recommendations also come that way. If they join the round its a bonus but im not afraid of predominantly doing ad ons or first cleans every day, its less time spent on the road travelling from A to B, less payments to track, less customer correspondence as you’re dealing with less people. 

 

[kissaclean]

So thought I'd share some feedback from a newbie. I practised once on my parents house last week, which is an extended 4 bed semi. Yesterday I did my first job for a friend of the family (word of mouth job), it was also an extended 4 bed semi but different layout and hence different windows / problems...

The job took me 3 hours and I ended up using 150 litres. I was using the pure freedom nano trolley with the SLX22 with the recommended medium brush with 2 pencil jets.

Quite why it took me so long I really don't understand, the time just seemed to fly. I wasn't in a rush but when it got to 1 hour I was thinking I need to hurry up because it'll be dark before I'm finished at this rate.

The downstairs windows weren't too bad as the owner has been cleaning them, the frames had all cobwebs and bits which is to be expected and it did take a while to get rid of all the bits, particularly the sills at the back between the sill and the window and also underneath the sills being full of cobwebs, it was difficult trying to turn the brush upside down to do this. The upstairs frames and windows were fairly bad, some of the sills had green algae that I did manage to remove.

I started off with the flow rate at 40 but about an hour in and I turned it up to 50, I found that there were so many bits that just seems to be never ending washing out of the sills so I turned the flow up to try and get rid of them quicker. At one particularly bad sill I turned it up to 100 and after about 1 minute I just gave up, the bits just kept on coming.

I only took 100 litres with me so I had to go back to my parents around the corner and produce another 50 litres so this didn't help time wise.

I found my neck was hurting that much that it made me feel physically sick for the rest of the day. My shoulders were hurting early on, something I guess will get better the more I get used to it.

I wore a thermal vest and was surprised how hot I was, there was snow / ice on the ground and I was absolutely boiling, if I was out any longer I would have had to take my coat off otherwise I would have passed out. My feet were a little bit cold though so maybe need some thermal socks.

At the back of the house it was extended out on the ground level so the windows above were set back. I had to fully extend the SLX22 and only just managed to get the brush on the glass, luckily the windows and frames were not that bad so I only lightly washed them but had they had green algae then I think I would have struggled as I was on my tip toes and holding onto the very end of the pole, really hard on the arms especially after 2 hours in as my arms were already tired.

There were plant pots that were over on their sides, when the lady that lives there came home (she was out) I had just finished. The first thing she said is 'thank you that looks great' the second thing was 'oh, what's happened to the plants', now obviously I explained that they were like that when I arrived, basically it's winter and people will not look at their gardens as often so won't notice things like that where the wind has blown them over weeks ago, because she knew me she believed me but I can see how easily it would be to get accused of breaking things by people who you have only just met and then it's just your word and whether they believe you.

I am absolutely skint and have less than £100 cash now and the bills coming in at the end of February will mean I'm about £300 short. I do office cleaning and house cleaning but have now dropped about 60% of work to allow me time to do the window cleaning. I am not panicking about it as I see as the situation only getting better now that I have done the first one. Basically I'm pretty much up and running, it doesn't really matter to me that it takes a long time to do the job as I know that speed comes with experience. I'm sure if I did the job again I'd do it in 2 hours.

I didn't quote the job, my father was the word of mouth and the friend just said well if he wants to practise he can do mine for £20. I accepted that even though it was on the low side as I needed the cash and also want somebody else's property to practise on. I would have quoted £25 for the first clean. It's the type of house that you guys on here would do in 25 to 30 mins for a first clean. Once done the owner said how much and I just said call it £20 as that's what I understood was the offer, anyway he gave £25 so it's the price I would have quoted for.

I was very happy with the results for my first job, the windows did look a lot better and the white plastics were all clean. I'd still find it hard to price the jobs but straight away I'm seeing that a bay window is harder than a normal window. a pvc porch has a lot of pvc that needs cleaning, the hose snags on anything and I need a univalve, having to keep going back to the machine to turn it off when re-adjusting position is a pain.

Strangely even though it was cold outside and ice on the ground and took a long time I'm looking forward to getting back out there on my next job. I'm taking my time with things as I don't want to try and run before I can walk but once I start to get the hand of it I will then start to chase after the work, up till that point it's a case of doing friends and friend of friends and getting organised and ironing out any issues with the set-up.

Thanks for all the advice guys, it's made it a lot easier reading on here about everybody's problems and recommendations that's made it possible for me to get going with very little mistakes on the way, if any really.

Chris.

This made a great read. I'm off ill at min with a hernia operation the other day .wish you all the best. Just keep pushing forward.

 

[Chris34]

Seems so long ago that now, my younger self seems like a nice chap, not like the older grumpy version

On a different note I'm glad you've brought this post up. I still use all the same kit that I had back then but for the last year or so my heart hasn't been in it, I've plodded on and tried different things to focus on to keep me at it but reading back at how it was in the beginning brings back older happier memories when I was more enthusiastic.

My machine actually broke yesterday, it was bullet proof up until then, just lost all power so I've been off today. I've checked it over and it seems to be an electrical fault on the contact that connects to the battery. I've got it going but I was fed up as the last month has seen bad weather, illness, van break downs and then this, on top of low enthusiasm it really hammers you, especially when there is no sun for months on end around here.

I'd say the hardest part of the job is keeping going. It's physically tiring and very boring. The business side is a doddle, there is always work if you're prepared to put in the effort to get it. The money is ok but you won't be rich in todays world of high house prices and high taxes, you won't starve and you'll be able to have a bit left over. It's just like having a good average job but you have to live with aches and pains all the time.

My plan is to continue with it for the next few years whilst setting up a non related product based business. I don't feel comfortable relying on window cleaning anymore because once everyone is in the 40% tax bracket then things are going to get increasingly difficult to make it work when all other costs are rising fast. So I'm looking at a business that allows me to earn a lot more and is not charging for my time (hourly rate). I'm also investing my money. So it's a case of not having all my eggs in one basket.