We have 7 full time window cleaners, they are on a good basic weekly wage plus they have a daily/weekly/monthly target to hit and they get paid a bonus based on this every 3 months.
If the weather turns bad they still get paid out of the bonus pot that has been built up.
There is some risk to us if we have several days/weeks of really bad weather, however there is also an incentive to them to work.
It works well for us.
We had a couple of window cleaners a few years ago who left us after doing a bit of a dirty on us, they set up on their own and bragged that they were going to take all our business. However I sent a letter to everyone of our customers and they ended up taking only about 20 houses (mostly old people) out of around 2000.
Things to be aware of:
- Make sure your cash balances cash every day, accept no excuses, if it doesn't it comes out of their wages.
- Where possible rotate the rounds so the same customers don't become too familar and loyal to individual window cleaners but are instead loyal to your business name.
- If paying bonus work make them aware that quality is not compromised and any complaints will need to be resolved by them, in their time, at their cost.
- Always make sure that they have enough work to keep them going for the day/week.
- Set realistic and achieveable targets, if they think the bonus is unachieveable then they'll just not bother trying.
- Think about paying a "finders fee" if they bring new work in, but don't pay this until after the third clean.
Hope this helps.
Off to Ravenglass now to drop off some bikes for group of Americans cycling the C2C!