I have never understood the people who always postpone unpleasant tasks until the last possible moment. As if it doesn’t add to the anxiety of doing something you do not enjoy, not to mention Murphy’s Law or Watson’s Law for cleaning – you are just looking for trouble or instant karma. Let me give you a fresh example.
A couple of weeks ago, on a slow Tuesday, we received a quote request from a Belsize Park tenant. He said he was moving out by the end of the week and needed the end-of-lease cleaning done by Saturday afternoon. No problem whatsoever, on the contrary – that gave us three days to schedule and execute the procedure, which is more than enough. We checked the address, and it turned out it was less than 200 yards away from the Belsize Park Tube station – things were getting better and better. We booked the service for Friday, early afternoon. Just another typical case, no hassle at all. That’s before everything went bonkers.
I was having a final tenancy cleaning checkup with a customer and her tenant near the Globe Lawn Tennis Club when my phone started ringing. I usually don’t pick up when I am with customers, but the phone kept buzzing incessantly. “This could be some emergency”, I thought and finally answered. To my surprise, it was our Friday booking. I immediately sensed that he was frantic because something had not gone according to his plans. As it turned out, his landlady had pushed the deadline to Friday, not Sunday afternoon, or he would lose his security deposit. The guy pleaded with me to push the appointment a few hours earlier to finish the job on time.
Something in that whole story sounded terribly fishy. I have been in the end of tenancy cleaning business for over a decade, and I’ve never heard of a landlord changing the deadline on a whim. Besides, why would you be so prickly about a couple or even a single day? I told the guy I would see what we could do about it and hung up the phone.
I vaguely remembered the address he had given us, and after a quick check in our system, it turned out I was less than a ten-minute walk from the place. He had also said that his landlady was living in the same building – across the hall, actually – so I put on my Sherlock cap and went digging for the truth.
When I rang her doorbell, the sweetest lady imaginable answered the door. She was small, neat, and very polite, a talkative woman in her late sixties who immediately invited me for a cup of tea. She didn’t lose her polite smile even when I explained the reason for my visit. “Oh, Nick is hopeless”, she sighed when I mentioned his version of the story.
She said he had already moved out ten days ago, assuring her that he would do the tenancy cleaning any day now. The building was located in the very heart of Belsize Park, with restaurants and cafes and great local businesses in the immediate vicinity – a prime location, as an estate agent would say. She already had inquiries about the apartment but couldn’t invite the people because she wanted it sparkling clean.
As this great lady who reminded me so much of my grandma was telling me all this, I could feel the anger boiling in me. I can’t stand liars, but I literally hate blame deflectors. Unfortunately, my customer was both – but we were going to do the job to the best of our ability as quickly as possible.
We had a free slot at 10 AM on Friday, and I booked it for the appointment. The crew did a fantastic job on the cleaning front, and the landlady was gleaming with satisfaction when she visited the apartment shortly after noon. “I will call the couple that wanted to see the apartment right away!”, she exclaimed, clapped her hands and pushed a paper bag of freshly baked cookies in my backpack. “For your team”, she winked and wished me a great day.
I admit we did all that without a word of consultation with our customer. When we finished, I notified him by email that we had done the job and had already consulted with his landlady, who had expressed her satisfaction. He could visit to receive his security deposit. The tone of the email could leave little doubt about my attitude towards his side of the story.
Is there some moral to that story? I am not sure – but I would rather do ten tenancy cleaning jobs for the lovely lady than book another appointment with Mr Blame Deflector.