Clean It Up
UK Window Cleaning Forum => Window Cleaning Forum => Topic started by: Kwackers on August 31, 2007, 03:07:39 pm
-
Just had a flyer through the door!
Basically were in a 3 Bed Detatched with a one storey extension.
We used to pay £8.00 when we had a Cleaner, which i thought was quite cheap.
The flyer is £4.00 per house!!!!
Silly Money!
-
I think the only person who could afford to do a detached house for £4 would either be on benefits or else Eastern European and out to make a quick buck. I can't imagine you'd expect amazing windows for £4!
-
3 bed detached + 1 storey extension has gotta be at least a tenner.
Like xpswindowcleaning said. Probably someone desperate or the price will go up very soon...
-
That's What i thought, Most people would quote £10-15 on our house
60p for a Wheelie bin!!
-
60p for a Wheelie bin!!
Strewth we are being robbed round here then.
£2.25 for wheelie bin cleaned fortnightly ??? ???
-
60p for a Wheelie bin!!
Strewth we are being robbed round here then.
£2.25 for wheelie bin cleaned fortnightly ??? ???
we had a qoute for 4.50 a bin :o :o
-
Forget that!
I'm not sure what this blokes game is, but even the wheelie bins, he need's to clean 9 an hour (include travelling time) to even make £5.00 an hour, that's less than 7 minutes per customer.
and £4.00 per house, £6.50 if you want insides, in's and outs on my house would take 45 mins!
-
Forget that!
I'm not sure what this blokes game is, but even the wheelie bins, he need's to clean 9 an hour (include travelling time) to even make £5.00 an hour, that's less than 7 minutes per customer.
and £4.00 per house, £6.50 if you want insides, in's and outs on my house would take 45 mins!
i guess he's just happy to earn a few quid a hour, loads of eastern eupoeans would be happy with 5 quid a hour
-
i guess he's just happy to earn a few quid a hour, loads of eastern eupoeans would be happy with 5 quid a hour
As one of my Polish mates said, back there he was earning the equivalent of £1.15/hour - even by the time they've paid rent here they're still quids in cause they can take back loads of money.
It's like if we could go to another country and get paid £100k pa for unskilled labour - go there for a year, milk it for all it's worth then buy yourself a nice house or whatever when you get back.
-
We have several local window cleaners around here charging that sort of price day in day out. They even pay to advertise in the local paper!
-
i guess he's just happy to earn a few quid a hour, loads of eastern eupoeans would be happy with 5 quid a hour
As one of my Polish mates said, back there he was earning the equivalent of £1.15/hour - even by the time they've paid rent here they're still quids in cause they can take back loads of money.
It's like if we could go to another country and get paid £100k pa for unskilled labour - go there for a year, milk it for all it's worth then buy yourself a nice house or whatever when you get back.
i spoke to a guy who was working as a "dogs-body" at a comercail i do, he was a teacher in polski and taught 7 - 11 yr olds, he spoke fairly good english, been over here for 18 months, has a wife and 3 children in poland, as a teacher was earning under 2 quid a hour
-
I am almost embarrased to say that I employ a Polish worker now..... NOT!!! :)
I pay him the going rate. Not anywhere near as low as minimum wage. He earns a lot more an hour than whoever is quoting those prices. He tells me he feels like a millionare now compared to what he used to earn in Poland. Tell you what guys.. boy do these guys work!! They are also smart enough to be able to set up with WFP and realise that at the speed they work that they can do houses for the sort of prices quoted here and still make what to them is mega bucks. Look out guys.they are coming :)
-
Look out guys.they are coming :)
indeed they are, and they will be happy to earn 5 quid a hour when they build a round for themselves
whats they falling though the floor--------------- oh its prices
-
I agree with you Matt.
At their speed of working they would probably make more like £8 to £10 an hour though and they will do a very good job as well.
1 of the reasons I employed my guy was you are far better to be in their good books. They are a pretty close knit lot and if you get the right guy the word will go out to leave well alone. :)
-
I agree with you Matt.
At their speed of working they would probably make more like £8 to £10 an hour though and they will do a very good job as well.
1 of the reasons I employed my guy was you are far better to be in their good books. They are a pretty close knit lot and if you get the right guy the word will go out to leave well alone. :)
its happened in the building game in the past 2 years , so i honestly belive it will happen in any manual job that they can do,
-
Got a Polish guy putting in a new bathroom for me. He turns up at 8 sharp and works right through until 6pm, including Saturday and bank holiday Monday.
He's charging half what I was quoted from the English firms around here and he's doing an excellent job and is polite with it....!!!
Only problem is his English is confined to: Yes please....No thank you....coffee....good morning and good night.
Still I dare say in a year or 2 he'll speak better English than me!
I've got the greatest respect for these guys.
-
I've got the greatest respect for these guys.
I've not, it's a sure fire road to doom & gloom for us all while ever these guys are pouring into our country at free will. yes, it may be great to save a few quid on having your bathroom fitted but, in the long run the only thing it guarantees for us is working ourselves for 5 quid per hour.
Round them up & send 'em back, that's what i say! ;)
tony
-
I've got the greatest respect for these guys.
I've not, it's a sure fire road to doom & gloom for us all while ever these guys are pouring into our country at free will. yes, it may be great to save a few quid on having your bathroom fitted but, in the long run the only thing it guarantees for us is working ourselves for 5 quid per hour.
Round them up & send 'em back, that's what i say! ;)
tony
it'll come to that much money in the end
anyways
the polish are not that great builders
http://www.reuters.com/news/video/videoStory?videoId=65013
-
I've got the greatest respect for these guys.
I've not, it's a sure fire road to doom & gloom for us all while ever these guys are pouring into our country at free will. yes, it may be great to save a few quid on having your bathroom fitted but, in the long run the only thing it guarantees for us is working ourselves for 5 quid per hour.
Round them up & send 'em back, that's what i say! ;)
tony
I can't see it coming to that...after all they are living in this country and paying the same prices as we are. If we can't survive on £5 an hour how can they?
I've not seen any Polish w/cs around where I work...so I'm safe for now ;)
-
I've got the greatest respect for these guys.
I've not, it's a sure fire road to doom & gloom for us all while ever these guys are pouring into our country at free will. yes, it may be great to save a few quid on having your bathroom fitted but, in the long run the only thing it guarantees for us is working ourselves for 5 quid per hour.
Round them up & send 'em back, that's what i say! ;)
tony
I can't see it coming to that...after all they are living in this country and paying the same prices as we are. If we can't survive on £5 an hour how can they?
I've not seen any Polish w/cs around where I work...so I'm safe for now ;)
i know a few builders who own houses to rent out, from the early 90's when they were available for nothing
1 rents to some polish, its a 2 bed house with lounge and dining room, they have 4 ( in bunkbeds ) to each bed upstairs and in the front room ( lounge ) they have another 4 in bunk beds, the dining room had a TV in and they sit around on milk crate with cushions on ( my builder mate even offered them 2 sofa's from free cycle, they didnt want them as they take up too much space )
so 12 to a house, they dont mind living like this as they are only after a cheap place to sleep, they may pay the same bills, but its between 12 of them, thus can afford to save money
-
They won't be wanting to live that way forever.
-
so 12 to a house, they dont mind living like this as they are only after a cheap place to sleep, they may pay the same bills, but its between 12 of them, thus can afford to save money
Plus we all need to work towards paying for a home/family etc - they can just scrimp and save as much as possible, take it back to Poland and it's all instantly worth five times as much.
It's not good for Poland either - people with degrees are coming here and working in bars etc, which is a waste of skills and means they're short of plumbers etc as they can't afford to pay our prices.
-
so 12 to a house, they dont mind living like this as they are only after a cheap place to sleep, they may pay the same bills, but its between 12 of them, thus can afford to save money
Plus we all need to work towards paying for a home/family etc - they can just scrimp and save as much as possible, take it back to Poland and it's all instantly worth five times as much.
It's not good for Poland either - people with degrees are coming here and working in bars etc, which is a waste of skills and means they're short of plumbers etc as they can't afford to pay our prices.
What is happening in Poland is that Lithuanian and other eastern block ppl are going there to fill up the gap left by the Polish that have left and the others think that they are on a good thing. Funny old world isnt it?
-
think back to when we first left school. We were happy with our few quid because we hd not had any before but then you buy a car, you buy a house and so on and you need more. the same will happen with them and they will soon want more. the money they are earning is only good if they take it back home, as its peanuts in this tax ridden country. Personally i think the skinflint customers that they will get are the ones that we would not touch anyway and there are plenty of cheap cleaners about already but i stil got too much work so why worry
simbo
-
the arent all that we are having our wages slashed by these peopple and we as a working class are once again being treated by our masters as disposeable oh they will need us one day to fight there wars for em just like grandpa who was unemployed prior to ww2 and afgter ww2 and despite a serious woud lived on a pitence of a pension with gran scared to put a fie on
-
And then after we show the poles etc how to clean & what to charge they will then set up on there own take over your area and charge less than you can afford to charge because you have morgage payments going out, i hope all you cheapjacks happy to pay min wage it comes back to bite you on the arse. It's happened before and it's going to happen again.If we didn't employ them they wouldn't keep coming over here and this country which i have protected in the Queens name would'nt be in such a poop state. :-[
-
The fact of the matter is polish etc dont come over here to window clean specifically, they come to workIn general the english are lazy and have to much ;pride' so wont do the crap jobs that they will!!
Thats why they get work and keep coming.
If we didnt have so many bums in the country then there wouldnt be any jobs for them...
-
mr powell had a good idea years ago .we should have shut the back door.n stopped them comming in .but the man was shot down in flames .look were we ar know .
-
MR COZY POWELL THE DRUMMER IN THE SEVENTYS
whats he got to do with doors ?
-
ur in the right era.cozy n jim morrison .
-
The fact of the matter is polish etc dont come over here to window clean specifically, they come to workIn general the english are lazy and have to much ;pride' so wont do the crap jobs that they will!!
Thats why they get work and keep coming.
If we didnt have so many bums in the country then there wouldnt be any jobs for them...
Most of the bums we are supporting are the lazy nuts from abroad, i've been all over the world and what i've seen they don't work that hard in their own country! if they did we wouldn't have to send millions of £ each year to prop the lazy nuts up, You may think your quids in now but when the nuts hit the fan how much do you think they will pay you when you need work?
-
mr powell had a good idea years ago .we should have shut the back door.n stopped them comming in .but the man was shot down in flames .look were we ar know .
Mr powell shot himself down by opening his mouth to soon!
-
looks like theres going to be a bit of competition . i can honesstly say that if anyone posted a flyer at the customers i do , either undercutting or giving a better service my custom would say no . once your custom get used to you as being a reliable cleaner they will keep you . so good luck to the poles . theres only 1 pole i no & thats wfp ;D
-
i've been all over the world and what i've seen they don't work that hard in their own country!
Just like the lazy ones in this country, they will go nowhere, see nothing, do nothing and moan about foreigners taking their work....
There world is full of doers and talkers and there ain't much work for talkers anywhere.
As for the doers, good luck to them. Wherever they are from.
-
I picked up a new customer the other day who recently sacked her last window cleaners (who were Polish) for 2 reasons:
1. Because she couldn't communicate with them.
2. Because they did I rubbish job.
I am charging her almost x3 the amount that they were charging her, but she is happy with my service and wasn't happy with their's.
Andy
-
Yes Andy but in general prices find their own level, its how the market works.
You are talking about one customer but what about the other 200 who are getting their windows cleaned for a third of what you charge?
Over time they will win simply because they are cheaper. They are commuting to here from Poland on Easyjet, working for a couple of weeks then going back . They have the best of both worlds.
The whole setup is geared in their favour. People love them
-
You are talking about one customer but what about the other 200 who are getting their windows cleaned for a third of what you charge?
Over time they will win simply because they are cheaper. They are commuting to here from Poland on Easyjet, working for a couple of weeks then going back . They have the best of both worlds.
They don't realise they're shooting themselves in the foot though as we have loads of people claiming benefits because they're not working. I think a lot of wasters in this country bring it on themselves though. I used to be Asst. Manager in a bowling alley in the biggest council estate in the UK - we paid above minimum wage and the work was easy, just sorting shoes/deep frying/pulling pints. If you had two legs you could have had a job but despite that, we never had enough staff and head office had to go to Poland to recruit. There was loads of unemployed people living within walking distance but the Job Centre said they wouldn't send them as people could choose what sorts of work they wanted to be put forward too and all though bar work etc was beneath them.
Of course, they were prob the same people coming in spending their benefit money and complaining about the service as we were short staffed.
-
We got the same situation around here. My local Costcutters...loads of youths happy to hang around outside smoking and swigging out of cans of lager. The shop had an ad in the window for part-time staff for weeks and weeks. Eventually the job was taken by a young Polish girl. Why didn't one of the lads take the job?...They don't want to work!!
-
A major problem is that not only do they not want to work but THEY DON'T HAVE TO !
-
Of Course. Why work when you can claim loads of luvvly benefits?
-
everybody seems to be forgetting something, thay don't speak english as well, they cant hold a converstaion about local gossip/history etc etc. They have a limited local knowledge and people are less likely to trust a foreigner, I mean would we be trusted to work at huge mansions in Poland ?
of course they deserve to get work but they wont be able to compete with a UK resident who knows the British sense of humor and can have a laugh with his customers! Luke
-
everybody seems to be forgetting something, thay don't speak english as well, they cant hold a converstaion about local gossip/history etc etc. They have a limited local knowledge and people are less likely to trust a foreigner, I mean would we be trusted to work at huge mansions in Poland ?
of course they deserve to get work but they wont be able to compete with a UK resident who knows the British sense of humor and can have a laugh with his customers! Luke
That's right. The work is there for us and our kind to lose. We have lots of advantages that foreigners don't.
Most work around here for example is for general cleaners, carers and packing meat or some other type in factories. All for minimum wage or a few pence over.
An average house costs £550 per month to rent. Band D council tax is £800 odd per year. What is the point of working for the majority of people when they are doing 40 hours for an extra £10 - £15 per week?
It's a benefit trap and the fault lies with the state and not the people who take advantage of it.
Same with foreigners. They didn't make the rules. Why blame them for our losses, or our perceived losses. It's beyond me??? ::)
-
Over time they will win simply because they are cheaper.
That's not true at all.
Many people choose better service over price!
Andy
-
BUT it will have a effect on prices, the middle priced people will lower prices to go head to head agaisnt the really cheap prices, then the uber expensive wil either have to rethink or lose biz
i would like to think if you do a good job a customer will not ditch you for a east european for the sake of a few quid
BUT
when the owner moves, and a new home owner moves in, who will they choose ?? ? ? the cheapest
-
Eastern Europeans are well disliked round here & a talking to many locals & custy's of mine wont have them on their property. ;D
I had a company on my house & a Eastern European was with them & i toild him to get lost, the guy he was working with said it's happening more & more down here.
-
I am an eastern european, and I get 30 pounds per hour and I know an old english man how gets half of that.
-
I am an eastern european, and I get 30 pounds per hour and I know an old english man how gets half of that.
Welcome to the forum, although with an attitude like that, I suspect your welcome might be somewhat limited.
-
I am an eastern european, and I get 30 pounds per hour and I know an old english man how gets half of that.
Welcome to the forum. Well done for valuing your labour properly.
-
I clean in Blackpool the windows cleaners here charge £4 for a semi and there not polish
-
did you know the unemployed actually look down on us
call us the mugs for busting a gut to bring home the bacon
-
did you know the unemployed actually look down on us
call us the mugs for busting a gut to bring home the bacon
well if they can live on a shoe string have nice things in life on the dole fair play to them. Earning what most on the dole get in 2 weeks you can earn in a day (whos the mug) ;D