Recruiting a window cleaner/subcontractor?

[Millhouse Window Cleaning]

Hi everyone, looking for advice! I run a window cleaning business in Kent with 4 large rounds. One of our guys left suddenly due to personal issues, and we’re struggling to find a replacement.

We operate on a subcontracting basis:

• Operatives earn £30-£40k/year with no admin, risk, or major overheads—just cleaning (and no stress of dealing with .
• We provide vans, handle all admin, marketing, canvassing, customer contact, round planning, and payments. Subcontractors just cover fuel and insurance.

It’s a great opportunity for an experienced window cleaner, but we’re not getting any decent applicants despite advertising on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Indeed.

We’re looking for someone with:

• At least 1 year of recent experience
• A full driver’s license
• English-speaking
• Based locally (Tonbridge/Tunbridge Wells/Sevenoaks area preferred).

Does anyone know someone interested or have tips on where to advertise? Thanks!

 

[johnny bravo]

can i re locate id be enticed if local. no pressures.

 

[Millhouse Window Cleaning]

can i re locate id be enticed if local. no pressures.

We would be delighted if you did, Johnny, because nobody in Kent seems to want it!

 

[Part Timer]

Hi everyone, looking for advice! I run a window cleaning business in Kent with 4 large rounds. One of our guys left suddenly due to personal issues, and we’re struggling to find a replacement.

We operate on a subcontracting basis:

• Operatives earn £30-£40k/year with no admin, risk, or major overheads—just cleaning (and no stress of dealing with .
• We provide vans, handle all admin, marketing, canvassing, customer contact, round planning, and payments. Subcontractors just cover fuel and insurance.

It’s a great opportunity for an experienced window cleaner, but we’re not getting any decent applicants despite advertising on Facebook, LinkedIn, and Indeed.

We’re looking for someone with:

• At least 1 year of recent experience
• A full driver’s license
• English-speaking
• Based locally (Tonbridge/Tunbridge Wells/Sevenoaks area preferred).

Does anyone know someone interested or have tips on where to advertise? Thanks!

I'd be very careful where you advertise, HMRC wouldn't look to kindly at your system. You would be classed as avoiding NI as you are actually, in the eyes of the law, employing not subcontracting.
To be a contractor you need to have at least your own tools and equipment

 

[Millhouse Window Cleaning]

I'd be very careful where you advertise, HMRC wouldn't look to kindly at your system. You would be classed as avoiding NI as you are actually, in the eyes of the law, employing not subcontracting.
To be a contractor you need to have at least your own tools and equipment

Hi, thanks for the advice. They have their own poles/equipment and choose their own working days/hours etc. We just supply the branded van with the fit out. The accountant has this under control and assures us workers are outside IR35 (can send substitutes for the work and have costs like paying their own insurance and poles/brushes etc).

 

[Part Timer]

Hi, thanks for the advice. They have their own poles/equipment and choose their own working days/hours etc. We just supply the branded van with the fit out. The accountant has this under control and assures us workers are outside IR35 (can send substitutes for the work and have costs like paying their own insurance and poles/brushes etc).

Glad you've taken professional advice, is franchising an option?
We do a job in your neck of the woods, Princess Mary Ave in Chatham.

 

[P4dstar]

Hi, thanks for the advice. They have their own poles/equipment and choose their own working days/hours etc. We just supply the branded van with the fit out. The accountant has this under control and assures us workers are outside IR35 (can send substitutes for the work and have costs like paying their own insurance and poles/brushes etc).

What you posted in the first comment is different to this though. They’re either provided everything or they aren’t. If you’re selling this as per the first comment it would lead HMRC to suggest they need to look a little further. Poles are extremely expensive. I’ve got a couple of grands worth in the back of my own van. Once you tell an employee they need to supply their own tools 30k isn’t quite as inviting, particularly in the London area. You say no major overheads but poles are costly.

I do understand the want to take on a subby and avoid employing. I completely appreciate you aren’t going to suddenly go “you got me, I was on the fiddle”. The truth is these types of posts where people are trying to stay one side of a very thin line to avoid employing someone all scream the same thing. The big black and white question to ask yourself is do these chaps get any work elsewhere and what would you do if they suddenly said they were doing a day for me and not coming in for you. 99% of the time I know what people who employ subbys would say.

FWIW if you want to employ a good standard of person treat them with the respect they deserve. Offer them a proper PAYE job and perhaps keep the subby option for people who genuinely prefer it too. Stop making them buy expensive poles and brushes… although I expect this was a red herring anyways. No one on here knows you, we’re not off reporting you to HMRC so you can do what you like at the end of it. You know the truth of your own business and why or how you’re employing subbys. If you want an easier path to solid recruitment you might have to decide to make a change.

 

[Millhouse Window Cleaning]

Glad you've taken professional advice, is franchising an option?
We do a job in your neck of the woods, Princess Mary Ave in Chatham.

It is and we are planning on it (but we want to do it differently in a truly win-win way) so the structure isn't completely sorted yet. One of the guys left suddenly due to personal problems and we have a round that needs someone NOW so no time to implement a new model.

 

[Iron Giant]

Hi, thanks for the advice. They have their own poles/equipment and choose their own working days/hours etc. We just supply the branded van with the fit out. The accountant has this under control and assures us workers are outside IR35 (can send substitutes for the work and have costs like paying their own insurance and poles/brushes etc).

This ain't sub contracting as I know, if your accountant is encouraging to tread a fine line I'd be cautious.

 

[Millhouse Window Cleaning]

What you posted in the first comment is different to this though. They’re either provided everything or they aren’t. If you’re selling this as per the first comment it would lead HMRC to suggest they need to look a little further. Poles are extremely expensive. I’ve got a couple of grands worth in the back of my own van. Once you tell an employee they need to supply their own tools 30k isn’t quite as inviting, particularly in the London area. You say no major overheads but poles are costly.

I do understand the want to take on a subby and avoid employing. I completely appreciate you aren’t going to suddenly go “you got me, I was on the fiddle”. The truth is these types of posts where people are trying to stay one side of a very thin line to avoid employing someone all scream the same thing. The big black and white question to ask yourself is do these chaps get any work elsewhere and what would you do if they suddenly said they were doing a day for me and not coming in for you. 99% of the time I know what people who employ subbys would say.

FWIW if you want to employ a good standard of person treat them with the respect they deserve. Offer them a proper PAYE job and perhaps keep the subby option for people who genuinely prefer it too. Stop making them buy expensive poles and brushes… although I expect this was a red herring anyways. No one on here knows you, we’re not off reporting you to HMRC so you can do what you like at the end of it. You know the truth of your own business and why or how you’re employing subbys. If you want an easier path to solid recruitment you might have to decide to make a change.

Poles are costly but if you look after them the last a long time so it's not a huge overhead when they're earning £600 - £1,000 a week. I can't find an employed window cleaner position for close to that kind of money. I didn't go into too much detail in the initial post - but essentially, the guys are definitely onto a good thing. And it's not fiddling anything - the CEST tool returned this result (attached), the accountant is totally satisfied and so are HMRC so there's nothing to report. I don't know if there's much else I can say about it. Nobody is getting short changed, least of all HMRC.

 

[johnny bravo]

you can be paid by the goverment for taking on apprentices. they pay there wage. you can then pay them a bonus at the end of the week to keep them happy and stay with you