Every service company has to deal with customer complaints at one point or another. Besides cleaning companies, this category could include anyone from a babysitter, hairdresser, painter, plumber, or anyone that offers service to the general public. Well established cleaning service companies, or other related companies, have a system in place to handle most types of service related issues, while smaller mom and pop companies, or independent cleaning ladies may not. In any case, every client should be aware of the basic categories of complaints we have identified and what to expect when filing one with a company or contractor. 

 

Even when dealing with highly dedicated and experienced service professionals, mistakes will be made, misunderstandings happen, details are overlooked, and there are always a certain percentage of people that will NEVER be satisfied, regardless of who does the house cleaning service. We like to categorize service complaints into four main categories. 

 

​Competitor Complaints.

Unfortunately, established companies will sometimes encounter an “under cover customer” just long enough so that they can file some type of service complaint. This “customer” is usually a competitor or a close acquaintance of the competitor whose sole purpose is to take up the time and resources of the company by raising unjustified and over exaggerated complaints about the service provided. What types of complaint do they normally file? This can be anything from false claims of the service provider arriving very late to the assignment, poor workmanship, and false claims of damaged or missing items, and the list goes on. These types of clients are difficult to detect but most often will make a reference to either another company that has done flawless work in the past, or a former “highly detail oriented cleaning lady” that is no longer works in the industry. 

 

Trolls.

Just like the Competitor Complaints, the troll will sign up long enough to say they have a business relationship with a company. However, they are much easier to detect since they can be readily found by doing a Google search. They typically spend much of their time on the Internet by starting arguments or upsetting people, by posting inflammatory, extraneous, or off-topic messages in a number of online communities (such as a newsgroup, forum, chat room, or blog) with the intent of provoking readers interest and dismissing an established company as a con. This is the main reason why we have a very clear policy regarding third party reviews and use of social media by employees, vendors, and outside service providers. Nearly always, a troll can be identified because they will put fake bad reviews on a number of companies of different sectors. They are not always detected though, because many times they will use fake profile names or variations of a real one.

 

Never Happy.

These complaints come from clients that were unreasonably unhappy with their last cleaning lady or service company, are unhappy with their current cleaner and will be most certainly be unhappy with anyone that provides service in the future! These clients are normally easy to identify and we will deny doing business with them if we have reason to believe they fall under this category. They are the type of client that will show outside service providers how to clean anything and everything, have had several other service providers that were not up to standard, and expects certain areas to be restored; floors, cabinets, stainless steel, and other items that wear over time. These clients are also very easy to identify. They will insist on touch up work every single visit. This usually escalates to a request to change cleaning crews; a service discount for what they feel is poor workmanship, or service cancellation.  If identified right away, most companies will willingly cancel any service agreement and let someone else deal with the headache. 

 

Legitimate Complaint. These complaints are real and they are from clients that expect a reasonable level of service quality. Anytime a real issue arises we will look into finding a solution quickly. The first step is to contact us by phone/text at (805)914-4520.  

 

The most common complaints, in no particular order, are:  too many changes in cleaning personnel, staff missed cleaning an area or item, area cleaned not to standard, broken item or damaged surface, product used has too strong of a scent, late arrival, cleaning lady  forgot to lock door, and cleaners left tool or product behind.  

 

So, if you have a real complaint, expect any reputable company to take care of it within a timely manner and in a way that will produce a positive outcome to all those involved.