[Davew]

I have a meeting this week with a property management company. If I was successful who draws up the contract? Them or me?

[Davew]

Are these cleaning agreements set up verbally then? Surely there would be something in writing even if it was only the frequency of clean and payment details?

[Moderator David@stives]

All my contracts are verbal, I dont have any written agreements with anyone.

I clean loads of business and flats and not one bit of paperwork in sight, apart from invoices of course

[Majestic]

If they want to get rid of you , a contract will not stop them

[East coast window cleaning Services]

Yeah i thought when i got my first ever contract but usually i just get a letter stating howmany cleans a year and how much im happy with that

[Trevor Knight]

If you don't wish to operate using a contract you MUST have signed Term's and Conditions!!!

What do you do if they are late paying, how much notice do they need to give you to cancel, how many days before they must notify you of any complaint, how many days do you have to rectify the complaint in? What frequency do you clean?

These are all possible situations that unless there is a clear understanding between you and the client it may cause you problems later on.

[Alex Gardiner]

I would agree with Trevor, originally most of my commercial work was agreed on verbally.

Now I get all contracts in writing as I have been 'caught' out by a clever loophole from a management company/residents association. The contract was 6 months behind on payments (after 4 years of  good, if occasionally late payment), when the residents decided that they were going to switch management company, this left myself and the cleaner and the gardener unpaid.

The management insisted that the clients were responsible not themselves as the agreement had been made on their behalf, the clients turned round and said that the management were responsible for settling all invoices. The debate went back and forward for a year. In the end I got signed statements from all residents bar one, saying that they had paid their fees in full. Because there was no written agreement between either myself and the management or the residents and I had not managed to track down one of the (now living elsewhere) residents to confirm their payment status, I could not proceed to the small claims court.

Lesson I learnt-get it in writing,because everything is fine until there is a dispute.