There are few things more aggravating in the cleaning business than walking into a building or home and seeing that your customer left you a complete mess.
You know the feeling.
The moment you see it, your mood drops about ten points and the first thought that runs through your mind is usually not very polite.
You start thinking things like…
“What in the world happened here?”
“Do these people have ANY idea what they left behind?”
“Are they trying to kill me?”
I get it.
I’ve walked into messes over the years that made me want to turn around, get back in the truck, and head home. But as painful as it is, this kind of thing does happen once in a while in the cleaning business.
And if you plan on staying in business for any length of time, you better understand that now.
When I first got started, this sort of thing used to get under my skin pretty badly. I would take it personally. I would stand there wondering how grown adults could possibly live or work like that.
Then after a while I realized something important…
It usually isn’t personal. It’s just the way some people are.
That doesn’t make it any less annoying, but it does help you deal with it better.
I remember cleaning accounts where every visit felt like some kind of strange surprise. You never knew what you were walking into. One week the kitchen looked decent, the next week it looked like they hosted a small football team and never picked up after them.
I’ve seen food stuck where it should never be, trash overflowing in every direction, and enough crumbs under furniture to feed a family of squirrels for the winter.
On the commercial side, I’ve had customers leave behind piles of junk that clearly should have been handled by somebody else. Not just normal trash either. I’m talking boxes full of heavy nonsense, broken equipment, stacks of paper, old books, and random items jammed into trash bags so heavy they burst open the second you tried to move them.
That’s when you find out real quick whether the customer left you “trash” or left you a project.
Now here is the important part.
You have to learn the difference between:
a customer leaving an occasional extra mess
and
a customer slowly turning your cleaning agreement into something much bigger than what you priced
Those are not always the same thing.
If it’s once in a while, and you priced the job right to begin with, sometimes the smartest thing to do is just handle it and move on. That was usually my approach. I liked to make life as easy as possible for the customer when I could. If the account paid well and the extra mess was only here and there, I usually just got it done.
Why?
Because I always liked to price on the high side whenever possible. So when a surprise popped up, I knew I was still being paid fairly overall. I wasn’t thrilled about it, but I could live with it.
That is one reason I always tell people not to bid jobs too cheap.
Cheap prices feel real bad the night you walk into a disaster.
If you are barely making any money on an account, every extra trash bag, every extra restroom issue, every extra mess on the floor feels ten times worse. But when you are priced properly, you have a little room to absorb the occasional nonsense without feeling like you are being robbed.
That matters.
Another thing you need to remember is this:
Not every cleaning visit will be “best case scenario.”
That’s fantasy thinking.
Some weeks there will be more traffic through the building.
Some weeks they will have meetings.
Some weeks there will be an office party.
Some weeks somebody will decide it is a good time to clean out storage rooms, file cabinets, or break areas.
And some customers are simply more disorderly than others.
That is part of the game.
When you bid a cleaning account, you should never price it as though everything will always be neat, light, and easy. That’s the same kind of thinking as the person who says they’ll be somewhere at 4:00 PM because they are assuming no traffic, no delays, and every light will turn green.
We all know that is nonsense.
Real life has traffic.
Real life has red lights.
And real life has customers who leave a bigger mess than you hoped for.
So what should you do when it happens?
First, stay calm.
Getting mad may feel good for about thirty seconds, but it won’t solve anything. If the mess is within reason, just deal with it professionally and move on.
Second, look at the big picture.
Ask yourself:
Is this rare?
Is this account still profitable?
Did I already price the job high enough to cover occasional headaches?
Is this just one of those nights?
If the answer is yes, then it may not be worth making a big issue out of it.
Third, watch for patterns.
This is where a lot of cleaning companies get burned.
One extra mess every now and then is one thing. A customer constantly leaving piles of extra trash, overloaded bags, or added work is something else entirely. If it keeps happening, that may be a sign you need to either have a polite conversation or adjust the price.
That is not being difficult. That is being smart.
Fourth, set limits when needed.
You do not have to become the unpaid cleanup crew for every unreasonable situation a customer creates. There is a point where “being helpful” turns into “being taken advantage of.” You need to know where that line is.
If the work has clearly gone beyond the original scope, deal with it professionally. Explain the issue in a calm way and let them know the current setup may need to be revisited.
And here is one more tip that can save you a lot of aggravation:
Build a little cushion into your pricing from the beginning.
That cushion is what protects your sanity.
It gives you room for the occasional surprise, the extra trash, the messy restroom, the breakroom disaster, or the night when it looks like nobody in the building has touched a trash can in three weeks.
Without that cushion, every small problem feels huge.
With it, you can usually say, “I don’t like it, but the account still makes sense.”
At the end of the day, messy customers are just part of this business. I wish I could tell you otherwise, but I’d be lying.
Some accounts will be neat and easy.
Some will be a little rough around the edges.
And some will make you shake your head the second you walk in.
That’s why you need to bid with common sense, think beyond the best-case scenario, and keep your emotions under control when the occasional mess shows up.
Handle what is reasonable.
Charge enough to make it worth your while.
And when a customer starts crossing the line too often, deal with it like a business owner.
That’s the real answer.