[Mark Bants]

I have not long started my cleaning business and we only have about ten small contracts at the moment. The problem we are getting is getting staff ! We pay £7 an hour but it just seems so many do not want to work. How do you get your staff and what do you do for holiday cover? cheers mark

[cml]

Mark sometimes it is not the recruitment of staff that can be a problem but also retention.  I am sure a lot of companies on here have are are experiencing the same problem.  You can try sourcing your local job centre. But be aware that this process can be time consuming as there are a lot of people who will call you when they are in the job centre with no real intention of trying to secure a job but will go through the formality.  (Something to do with their eligibility to claim benefits i guess).  On the brighter side there are some very good people who are serious and would gladly take up the job if offerred to them.  Alternatively if you have a local freebie paper try advertising in the classified sections if it does not cost too much as it can be expensive).  Local ads on supermarket boards etc.

Good luck!

[Colin Stokes]

We pay £7 an hour as well but thats London -(dont know where you are) but dont have any problem finding staff (although as the other poster said it takes time to sort 1 or 2 decent ones from 70 replies)  but stereotypically they tend to be Eastern European.  In fact whereas we used to advertise in job centres it now tends to be a Lithuanian paper/web site in London - it does help that one of my "second in commands" is also Lithuanian although I can now speak a little myself.

Re Cover I have either offered exisiting staff overtime, used a specialist agency (they charge £10.15), or pitch in myself if i really have to.  Now we are a little bigger I build spare capacity into a supervisors schedule as well.

[Mark Bants]

Thanks for reply's guys Colin we are based in Surrey. What specialist agencies are there as that seems a good idea if i get stuck? I have friends that run cleaning businesses in London and i am told it is much easier getting staff because of the sheer number of people. We also have several pub cleaning contracts that seem impossible to staff We can get the week covered but no chance at weekends so i am out doing it.

[Colin Stokes]

There is one specialist agency I use but they are primarily based in London.  If that may be of use to you then e-mail me; colin_tcs@yahoo.com and i'll let you have the details.

[myvanwi]

Thanks for reply's guys Colin we are based in Surrey. What specialist agencies are there as that seems a good idea if i get stuck? I have friends that run cleaning businesses in London and i am told it is much easier getting staff because of the sheer number of people. We also have several pub cleaning contracts that seem impossible to staff We can get the week covered but no chance at weekends so i am out doing it.

Mark,
We also have trouble getting staff, it is so time consuming and then trying to keep hold of them is virtually impossible. How do you manage to pay £7 per hour we can only just manage £6.50? Also on your pub cleans how much do you charge as we have been asked to quote but I know how much work there is cleaning a pub so dont want to undercharge. Any help gratfully received.

[Pristine Clean]

Thanks for reply's guys Colin we are based in Surrey. What specialist agencies are there as that seems a good idea if i get stuck? I have friends that run cleaning businesses in London and i am told it is much easier getting staff because of the sheer number of people. We also have several pub cleaning contracts that seem impossible to staff We can get the week covered but no chance at weekends so i am out doing it.

Mark,
We also have trouble getting staff, it is so time consuming and then trying to keep hold of them is virtually impossible. How do you manage to pay £7 per hour we can only just manage £6.50? Also on your pub cleans how much do you charge as we have been asked to quote but I know how much work there is cleaning a pub so dont want to undercharge. Any help gratfully received.

if you can barely manage £6.50 ph then you are not charging enough to the clients.

Minimum should be £9.29 on wages of £6.50 based on 30% profit. ph

With regards to pub cleans p/h Saturdays £7.50 Sunday £8.50 Monday to Friday £6.50 thats to your staff. so add 30% to those wages. Dont forget to add on for your supplies and chemicals.

also depends on number of hours as you may give client a discount for large amount of hours. Depends if you want the contract or not...


Dave 

[Lesley J]

we have been advertising two vacancies for 3 months offering £7.00 per hour, in local papers, job centre, local boards, anywhere I could put a wanted card up, we filled the jobs this week, but will they stay? who knows, its nearly impossible to plan ahead to next week. let alone next month..