[Og]

"Merry Christmas"?

[Smurf]

Bah humbug!...Trading standards springs to mind 

[Frankybadboy]

Most restaurants add it to the bill (12.5%) so why not?

Same here I'm impressed, most of my customers think I should be giving them a tip the ungrateful sods, have left it too
late for this year but will definitely be giving it a go next year. A £3 or £4 a year service charge isn't much in the scheme of things.

Come on, it cant be just me saying how wrong this is!  Yes great idea, im sure we've all thought of it at some stage in our many yrs of doing this work, but decided against it for a very good reason. No, its not down to having balls to do it, either.

As already stated, your customers have agreed a set charge for the agreed service. At that point it should be made clear that come december there is a X %age service charge applied. That would then be above board. Compared to just adding it and hoping they dont notice it and if so, think can excuse it as a service charge.

Yes restaurants or certain ones apply an automatic service charge. This is expected. However, after 11mnths of same charge and then charge a service charge unexpectedly or even after many yrs of service for a set fee and out of the blue, a service charge is somehow applied in december and not any other month. It is very questionable business behaviour, which im sure if officials looked at it, there would be trouble! (No im not saying they will am i threatning it, just to be clear if anyone takes this the wrong way)

Question:  obviously youve already been doing this, this month. What do you say to your regular client when they come to the door to pay you the normal payment?

so far i had one who refuse so after 10 years of cleaning them , i dumped um

am i worried,no i have a waiting list for my services

[Frankybadboy]

Bah humbug!...Trading standards springs to mind 

nothing ive done wrong

[Smurf]

Bah humbug!...Trading standards springs to mind 

nothing ive done wrong

Really hows that then... Please explain why you think it's ok to slap on an extra charge out of the blue.

[Og]

Just tell them all the other cleans are at a discounted price. Magic.

[Smurf]

Would only take one person/customer to report you to trading standards and then you would be up poope creek without a paddle that's why.

[Thr-windowcleaning]

You heard of royalty payments too? 

service charge, innit 

i think this is a better way to word it"service charge" thanks for that

i wont feel so guilty now

i am charging every customer on the round so it should bring in a extra £1500 roughly give or take a bit.now am i being stupid

[nathankaye]

Would only take one person/customer to report you to trading standards and then you would be up poope creek without a paddle that's why.

Glad im not the only one speaking sense on here. I cant believe how much he's convinced himself that its a good idea and perfectly legal and fine to do.

[AuRavelling79]

Best wind up on here for ages.

But I'll play along and so here's a question Franky; if your customer isn't in and you leave a slip for payment and let's say it's a £20.00 job.

Do you write a bill for £23.00 and not mention anything or do you write something like "includes Xmas tip"? Or "includes discretionary tip of £3.00"?

[Tom White]

ive been cleaning lots of my customers windows for over 20 years but i wouldnt dream of just adding £3 to their bill at xmas!IMO its just plain wrong.i let the customer decide whether they d like to tip me at xmas(most dont but thats fine too)

They'd tip you better, Daz, if you didn't clean the windaz (is that where 'Daz' comes from?) like this:



Sort it out, mate, we use squeegies and wfp these days.

[Frankybadboy]

Would only take one person/customer to report you to trading standards and then you would be up poope creek without a paddle that's why.

smurf dont be a silly billy


nothing wrong with a service charge for the job ive done over the year so cant see a problem,


Gold i just write £20 +£3 for xmas tip/service charge


i had such a good day yesterday with the tips and response from customers that i am even going to go out and work a saturday today which i never doo

[martin hulstone]

I presume this is a wind up but if is not, i genuinely feel sorry for you that after a year of window cleaning you have to resort to self charging for xmas tips to make ends meet over the festive period.
Maybe we should have a whip round for you!

[Don Kee]

After reading this thread, I'll never call you dippy again Frank   

[jk999]

I think it's wrong what he's doing but if customers are giving it to him then they must be thick minded .I remember a friend of mine used to clean windows and one year did just downstairs so every customer got a clean .one day a customer came out and said is it half price with just doing downstairs he said no its full price because it's Christmas,the customer said ok here you go full money a tip for you don't bother coming back to clean my windows

[Tosh]

I presume this is a wind up but if is not, i genuinely feel sorry for you that after a year of window cleaning you have to resort to self charging for xmas tips to make ends meet over the festive period.
Maybe we should have a whip round for you!

We already did for Franky when he took the stabilisers off his bike and fell off. 😅

[8weekly]

Thinking small. It should be 10% of annual billings. So on a £20 house that's £24 for the year.

[SeanK]

What's making ends meet got to do with it ? seriously do any of you guys run it past your customers and wait for all to answer when you up your prices, no you clean the property charge them the extra with a slip explaining why, he's charging them an
extra £3 one off service charge because they where too miserable to acknowledge his excellent service over the year, getting off
light in my books.
Maybe it will teach them not to take people for granted though I doubt it.

[SeanK]

Thinking small. It should be 10% of annual billings. So on a £20 house that's £24 for the year.

I agree but maybe taking £24 out in one go without notifying them might be pushing it, maybe another smaller tip at Easter
might be a better option.

[ben M]

Well done Franky but why only £3 ? you should ask £5, the new £5 notes look lush!