[AJCleaningServices]

Most of you should know that our typical rate is £9-00 per hour, here is our current leaflet.
   
We got e-mail:

“hi there
we require a cleaner two hours per week to start asap, normal duties expected, we feel that its possible to clean the full house in two hours and there may be some ironing involved and do you also cover washing cloths costs involved
sender’s name”

The sender has also left message on our answer machine asking to call him back, so my partner called him and said that we would charge him £15-00 per hour for cleaning his place.

He leaves 6.3 miles away from a little town where we advertise, the roads to his house are not very good, he gives just two hours we would have to take our cleaner there then take her back, which would make total 25 miles for just 2 hours of cleaning.  We agreed quote him in a hope that later we would find more customers in his village, so our judgement was £15-00 per hour. 

He was very unhappy to hear our quote, as he knew our typical rate was £9-00 per hour.  He said to my partner that he would agree for £10-00 per hour but not £15-00.  She apologised and said that we would not be able to do his place for less that £15-00 per hour.  Conversation finished.  However Maria said to me that that man did not sound as a gentleman. 

Later that day we got e-mail from him or his wife:

“thanks for the call, but i am very unhappy that you wish to con and rob people of £15 per hour when your paperwork states only £9 i will pass this to our legal departwent”

So I responded:

"Dear Mrs SENDER,

I understand your disappointment.  My partner - Maria, advised me that Mr SENDER did not sound as a gentleman over the phone.

We do charge in Ponteland and Darras Hall areas £9-00 per hour.  It is for us to decide how far from there we are prepared to travel without adjusting our charges accordingly. 

I do not know what “your legal department” could do with our advertisement.  I guess they may display it somewhere so everybody would see that we are offering a good value for money service in Ponteland area.

What you should do is contact another cleaning company to see if they would come to your place for two hours and do cleaning for less than £15-00 per hour.

You could also take “our paperwork” to the Trading Standard Agency and see what they say. 

Best wishes,

Arthur Rudzenis
Partner
A & J Cleaning Services"

I thought the matter was over but this morning I got another e-mail where he or his wife DEMANDS us to clean their house:

“Hi there i have spoken to my lawer who has pointed out that your advert is incorrect and you are open for legal action, as there is no comment about £9 for darras and ponteland only. It clearly states that your typical rate is £9 with no vat to pay.
Therefore we request that you clean our home for £9 as its your typical rate.
Your wife was incorrect as my husband was a perfect gentelman on the phone as i was in the room with him and i do not like slander against my husband”

Could you believe it…

I am yet to respond to the above  :, but I am not here for advice how to deal with this, just wanted to entertain you a little bit…

Regards,

Arthur

 

[*Chris Browne]

I would ask to speak to there "legal advice"(bloke down pub) and then tell them you will clean who you want and when you want at what ever price you and your client agree on, just dont waste time with these wasters arthur, you will come across lots of prats like this anyway your leaflet is perfectly ok saying"typical " but it might be an idea to change it to "from"


chris

[mxg]

Arthur

If you want to continue advertising your rates (and personally I don't or wouldn't) it might be worth adding one little word to your leaflets ie "from" - that then clearly gives you the option to charge depending on circumstances.

Mick

[AJCleaningServices]

Thank you for your posts,

I think stating "from" would be confusing.  I am going to stop showing the price at all, as it will be increased very soon (VAT and minimum wage...)
 
I do not advertise were they live, so they have no reason to say that my price over there promised to be £9-00 per hour. 

...He leaves 6.3 miles away from a little town where we advertise, the roads to his house are not very good, he gives just two hours we would have to take our cleaner there then take her back, which would make total 25 miles for just 2 hours of cleaning.  We agreed quote him in a hope that later we would find more customers in his village, so our judgement was £15-00 per hour...

However, how much would you charge in my case?

Regards,
Arthur

PS Don’t they think I am a slave?

[lynngc]

Arthur,
personnaly i would not respond to the second e-mail, ignore there letters, if they call, say you have been advised not to enter into any conversation with them,( bluff ) tell them you have now passed this matter to your solicitors,  they will give up eventualy. don't give them any more info for fuel.

good luck

lynn

[martin19842]

hi there

just walk away from it, no communication nothing.  its your business you deal with the customers/clients that you wish to trade with.

just imagine the person walking into a car dealer ship telling the owner that you WILL sell me a car.  Take a hike.

you dont need clients like this.

the word TYPICAL is a good word to use,

if you see some adverts on the tv from loan companies i think the phrase goes "OUR TYPICAL INTEREST RATE IS XXXX"

move onto the next client

the other thing aswell, we never talk about hours to do a job,,

its always it will cost £xxx.xx to do that.  if it takes you less time then you make more money.

regards

martin

[AJCleaningServices]

We state hourly rate as this is the way many cleaning companies do here...

...No way we are going to do them even if they offer us £25-00 per hour...

Regards,
Arthur

[marts - Martin Reed]

arthur

I think you'll find that you have to be careful what is down in writing to members of the public... if your advertising at £9 per hour and not specifiying area or location then the public is in the right...

someone from devon could call you expecting £9 per hour... if your going to show prices publicly then use "FROM" to cover yourself..

Remember the customer is always right [but we know different] and there word of mouth is a valuable tool of advertising

martino

[garyj]

They cannot demand you clean their house, as Martin said that's up to you.
I'm not sure if I agree with not contacting them again and I would now be looking at this as a damage limitation exercise. If they want to they could prosecute for miss-selling and false advertising, the penalties for that are very stiff and would finish you as a business. Agree to the £10 an hour ( or better still the £9ph rate) and arrange to go and see them, the chances are they don't want you know anyway. If they do still want you, tell them you need a month up-front and do anything you can to get out of actually cleaning their place. After a week or two give them notice and leave! but it won't come to that.

Its not ideal and there must be better solutions and I really don't think you have a chance in hell of getting the business anyway, but they do have you over a barrel on your charges and that would be worrying me.

Don't worry about the slander allegations, that is rubbish, you can go around and say what you like about anyone, that in itself tells you they have had NO legal advice at this point but like I said earlier I think they could make your life very uncomfortable over the advertised costs and miss-selling. Don't think for a minite you'll get any other business in this area now, they are already telling everyone about your company, it sounds as if they have nothing else to do.

[AJCleaningServices]

Martino,
We do specify the area we serve in our current leaflet, however do you not think that we reseve the right simply refuse to work for somebody we do not like for whatever reason.
Regards,
Arthur

[marts - Martin Reed]

arthur

if you specfy in your leaflet the areas you cover then there's nothing legally they can do because they live outside the boundaries....

and yes, off course you have the right to refuse work but remember word of mouth can be good or can have a negative view of your company to other prospective clients...

martino

[andrew chrysler]

Arthur:

Don't take it to heart.

This kind of @ssho!e customer is no doubt such a prat that he has no friends left to tell how unfair you have been.

I have had dozens of similar letters, emails, calls, even a solicitor's letter from one person who we declined to sell a caravan to (because we did not want him as a customer, no other reason, and no racial issue)

They all say "legal advisor" (bloke down the pub) or "solicitor" (bloke down the pub who wears a tie or even "barrister" (bloke down the pub in suit and tie)

I laughed at the one who said "barrister" as anyone who has watched "Kavanagh QC" knows that the public do not instruct barristers, solicitors instruct barristers.........

The solicitor in the above case was quite persistent (the bloke's brother in law) but even he pi$$ed off eventually.

Threats that "I will tell trading standards" or "solicitor" or even "Watchdog" have all been that.... just threats.

I have a waiting list of people wanting to spend £40,000 plus on a new caravan on my park, despite all these unhappy clients threatening to ruin my reputation

An advert is legally an "invitation to treat"... in other words it says that "if you offer me £9 an hour, I might be prepared to accept that fee for my services"

NO CONTRACT EXISTS UNLESS HE HAS PAID YOU AND YOU HAVE ACCEPTED HIS MONEY

Tell the prat to shove his cleaning where the sun doesn't shine, and UNDER NO ACCOUNT do any work for him, as then a contract could be formed.

Word of mouth from a prat like this.... don't worry, he probably spreads rubbish about all sorts of businesses to those people bored enough (and stupid enough) to listen.

One prat talking out of his @rse, versus all your happy customers.....

No contest... you keep your reputation.

Don't let it get to you, there's people like him everywhere. Sleep soundly.

All the best, Andrew.

[AJCleaningServices]

They cannot demand you clean their house, as Martin said that's up to you.

Gary,

I think the same, we have not committed ourselves to do that place and I think that I am not a slave…
 

I'm not sure if I agree with not contacting them again and I would now be looking at this as a damage limitation exercise. If they want to they could prosecute for miss-selling and false advertising, the penalties for that are very stiff and would finish you as a business.

As I said earlier we do not promote our service in that little village.  We have never leafleted it and I have just received confirmation by e-mail from “a very local parish magazine”, which states that they do not cover that area as well, so no miss-selling have been taken place…  

I am not holding a monopoly on providing domestic cleaning service in that area…

...Don't think for a minite you'll get any other business in this area now, they are already telling everyone about your company, it sounds as if they have nothing else to do...

We are very well established in the area we are marketing, they cannot do anything to damage our reputation, as we have not even been working for them…

We do however leave some of our customers occasionally, but I can assure you no one cleaning company is perfect.  We try to do our best, but sometimes we just do not worry when things go differently then we would all wish…  I am sure you know that customers are not saint as well…  We are all humans…

Regards,

Arthur

[marts - Martin Reed]

well put andrew... don't think they'd mess around with you... arthur, give andrew the customers address instead of replying 

martino

[AJCleaningServices]

Andrew you are right, like always,  

I am not worried about their plans to take “actions”… I have even advices them where to go – The Trading Standard Agency.

The more I listen to what they say the more I understand that they have no understanding of what they are talking about:

At first she/he was going to pass my “paperwork” to their “legal department”
Now they say their lawyer
Tomorrow it will be his/her mum?



Regards,

Arthur

[AJCleaningServices]

well put andrew... don't think they'd mess around with you... arthur, give andrew the customers address instead of replying 

martino

Will do 

[andrew chrysler]

I could always write to the customer saying that I won't clean them for £9 either............

Maybe everyone on the forum should write and say that we won't clean him for £9

[*Chris Browne]

thats not a bad idea, give us the email address arthur.......power to the people


chris

[AJCleaningServices]

Thanks,
But would better not...
I have to be careful how I handle this matter...
Regards,
Arthur

[garyj]

The bit that worries me is they have advertised they clean for £9.00, and then quoted £15, this is miss-selling and does contrevene trades discriptions.
Andrew has said he would tell the guy to take a hike and has told people before where to get off, thats easy, we've all done that, I've even done it with a contract worth nearly £10,000 per month. However that is not the issue Arthur is dealing with here. If Andrew had advertised a caravan for £9,000 and when they came to view and buy he told them it is actually £15,000 he would be in trouble.

It is this area, and this area only that would be concerning me right now, like I said I this is a damage limitation exercise and if persued by them, they might well win.