CBL Episode #113-When to Fire: Making Tough Employee Decisions

Every cleaning business owner eventually faces the dreaded moment when they must decide whether to keep struggling with a difficult employee or let them go. 

This raw, candid conversation dives deep into the realities of employee termination, offering practical wisdom for those agonizing over toxic workplace situations. We have all worked in a toxic environment at one point in our working careers.

We also share the precise warning signs that indicate it's time to part ways with staff members – from the employee who consistently gives "underpaid vibes" complaints to those who damage client relationships through poor communication. The unmistakable red flag? 

There is also a reference to Dan Kennedy, ad copy guru, he has a famous saying for when it's time to part ways with a client's that mis behave. 

"When you find yourself waking up three mornings in a row thinking about an employee problem. As the saying goes, if they're consuming that much mental space and you're not sleeping together, it's time for them to go."

The cornerstone of successful termination is proper documentation. We walk through exactly what this means: starting with verbal warnings (which you must document in your calendar), followed by written documentation, and finally termination if behaviors don't improve. Without this crucial paper trail, you're vulnerable to unemployment claims that can significantly increase your tax burden. 

Beyond the legal considerations, we explore the human elements of termination – conducting the conversation in a public place rather than your home office, ensuring you have a witness present, providing final payment properly documented as "last and final pay," and maintaining the employee's dignity throughout the process. Your approach during these difficult moments not only protects your business legally but preserves your reputation in the community.

Listen for crucial distinctions between handling W-2 employees versus 1099 contractors, state-specific employment laws you must know, and strategies for preventing problem employees from contaminating your entire team culture. Managing staff effectively isn't just about finding great cleaners – it's about creating systems that protect your business when relationships don't work out.

This is not the book that mentions the Dan S Kennedy quote, but it is an interesting topic: https://amzn.to/4ld7Owg or here: https://amzn.to/4iKZp1c

It can be crowed when trying to figure out who you are going to learn from

Erica Paynter is the brains behind My Virtual Bookkeeper, a bookkeeping firm for cleaning companies, and the creator of Clean Co. Cash Flow Academy and the Clean Co. Collective. She’s on a mission to help cleaning business owners make sense of their numbers without boring them to tears! Erica’s all about turning messy books into profit-packed powerhouses.

 support@myvbk.com 

Up your cleaning game, join over 6000 Cleaning Business Owners most of whom are located here in the United States.  

Chapters

• 1:44 Introduction to Employee Termination
• 3:02 When to Let Someone Go
• 6:12 Documentation and Paper Trail Importance
• 9:56 Problematic Behaviors and Setting Boundaries
• 17:53 Dealing with Unemployment Claims
• 26:47 W-2 vs 1099 Worker Considerations
• 32:59 Proper Termination Procedure
• 43:35 Final Payment and Avoiding Cash Trap
• 47:43 Insurance Requirements and Closing Thoughts

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:52

I don't know what the deal is.

Speaker 2: 0:54

Sporting in progress. Yes, it is.

Speaker 1: 0:56

Hello Jamie. Hi, how are you Good? Long time no see.

Speaker 2: 1:01

I know I love that. I love that getup. You got going on Nice shirt. Yeah, the scarf, I love it.

Speaker 1: 1:09

I feel a little what do they call them Flight attendee? A little bit, I was just like I had to change really quick and I'm like what do I have? I'm like I like this linen jacket and I like this.

Speaker 2: 1:21

I picked this scarf up at a thrift store and I was like this goes perfect, but it's a little I do feel I didn't get it just right. So you'll probably see me fuss with it Because I put on my little little hoodie, my above all cleaning services.

Speaker 1: 1:42

I have one that I need to pick up. I had it in um embroidered. The first time I picked it up I'm like it's not here let me show you guys on the back, oh nice, all the girls have them, or all my employees have it.

Speaker 2: 2:01

And, um, speaking of employees, we're here to talk about what to do. When is the time that? When is the time right to decide of whether or not to let someone go right as far as an employee?

Speaker 1: 2:20

has come up in the groups in the last couple weeks and the very first thing I will say is you can only terminate a w-2, you cannot terminate a 1099. There just isn't any work for them, there really isn't a process, and we can talk about that another time. So this particular person was in the group and she had hired a bad hire. Sometimes that happens Even when you think it's your golden unicorn. You know the shininess wears off and you eventually go okay, well, this is the person I've got. Am I going to keep them? Am I not going to keep them?

Speaker 2: 2:53

You start seeing through stuff. Stuff starts falling through the cracks a little.

Speaker 1: 2:58

Right. The threshold for your tolerance to their stuff becomes smaller and smaller and smaller and then when you get to the point where there is no more threshold and you're just tired of the drama, it's time to let them go and you don't want someone who holds you hostage emotionally, I mean, and I bring this up every once in a while and I've seen Dan Kennedy resurface. He's actually the godfather of ad copy and I have his books. I have a couple of his books. It's like the no BS guide to. He has a bunch.

Speaker 1: 3:31

I'm writing this down, let me see. These are dated. They probably need to be updated, but he is the godfather of ad copy and his whole premise is he actually had coaching he took on. You know he had an ad agency at one point. This is how, like long, they brought him back. I've seen him all over facebook.

Speaker 1: 3:49

Um, dan kennedy used to have a dog million. His dog's name was million dollars and he's very much a man's man and his whole premise behind working with someone was I had to fit into certain criteria, like when you look for your clients, and basically and it's kind of crass but it's very effective to remember he took on a client and she was a nightmare and basically he said you know, if I wake up three mornings in a row thinking about you and we're not sleeping together, it's time for you to go. So if you have a W-2 that is taking up a lot of space in your head, it's time for you to consider where you're going with this individual, because the relationship is over Now. I'm not one to implement a bunch of new strategy. I went and like I'm guilty of this myself. You get a coach. You're like I'm going to do all of these changes and you already have an established crew. They're going to go.

Speaker 2: 4:46

Oh, everything's been working fine, why are you doing? Why, yeah, yeah, everything's working fine for them, right?

Speaker 1: 4:55

Right, you don't want to push someone out unnecessarily, but there comes a point where you need to let them go. They're no longer beneficial to you, they're no longer beneficial to your business. It's time to kind of push them along out the door. So there's this process that has to happen. You would like to have it happen, and this is where everyone kind of goes, because not everyone's had to deal with human resources or any of that stuff. This is all new to you guys, right? So you have to have a paper trail, just like when you're dealing with the IRS or the state entities or your local law enforcement or whatever it is you're dealing with. You need to have a paper trail to provide proof, especially in some of your more liberal states like Boston. Oh my gosh, you cannot fire someone just because In Arizona we're right to work, so it could happen. But you make sure you check the laws in your state that you operate out of, so you don't get reamed later with fines and penalties and all kinds of shaming. Yes, it can be a thing. So this is actually a post. We won't say from what group, but, right, it was an anonymous, remember. I'm going to read it out and then I want to get your opinion on what you think the audience should do with this situation. It says hello, I'm debating firing an employee. This is an actual W-2 because I asked.

Speaker 1: 6:21

She is rude, entitled and horrible at communicating, but she is an amazing cleaner and that's always the case right this week. She told me Sunday that she went away for the weekend and can't make it to work on Monday. She locked a door when the notes said not to and I had to get a locksmith and she didn't respond to my message about this. She complained and said this job gives her underpaid vibes. Wait, there's more. She never tells me when she needs off until after the schedule is made. She complains that she doesn't get tipped. She says she won't do apartments because it's too much to carry. I don't blame her, it is.

Speaker 1: 7:03

It can be if, depending on the circumstance, at what point you cut your losses. And there's an edit at the bottom says I took your advice and fired the bad apples. Today I don't believe my employees don't feel appreciated. I thank them them all the time, give regular raises, buy birthday, christmas presents, small things throughout the year, to let them know I appreciate them. The girl I was speaking of in the post didn't show up for work today. She said she isn't coming in for this particular job. The other girls accused me of stealing money, not paying her. I told her she probably put the account info in the wrong account and asked her to verify, instead of doing what she called me cursing and cursing me out, demanding to be paid cash. This happens a lot. I checked if she did put the right account info in. I thanked her for what she's done. She's no longer needed. So this, this, this I'm going to be honest. This is a shit show that she, this business owner, caused.

Speaker 2: 8:00

He's allowed it, she's allowed it to happen and she has no one to blame but herself true, and this is this is whenever I you know what I've I've been there and I I may be there now. So, uh, we've all been there. Yeah, no, this is something that exactly what you were saying. We're not in hr, you know you're just. They're so good at making sure you know they're the best cleaner ever, but, um, the amount of the amount of lies that they have to keep up with, the bull crap that they spit at you.

Speaker 1: 8:42

This is not going to be PC, by the way. We're going to use curse words in this one, yeah.

Speaker 2: 8:57

So, the amount of bullshit that they throw at you all the time and you just deal with it because they're, you're short on the schedule or you're, you know you're trying to run. It's like, man, who else am I going to train? And you're paying them so well that it's like why am I being stepped on like this, right, why am I being stepped on like this? This and I think a lot of people don't know the process is like of okay, I'm not dealing with this anymore, how do you get rid of them? How do you do? Do you have to write them up first? You know, are they going to come at you? Uh, uh, you know they could.

Speaker 2: 9:36

It seems like some people can really try and cause a lot of havoc with, like you know, claiming unemployment and, um, what does that even look like? You know, I, I have not knocked on wood, but I don't even know. You know, I know I pay into it, right, so I, I don't know, um, what the steps are really whenever you have a bad somebody that no longer fits your compass, your moral compass, first of all, but that's not first of all, but that's not jiving with your business and it's starting to affect others.

Speaker 1: 10:26

Well, the first thing that I see with this particular post and, mind you, I don't know who this person is, it was anonymous and I don't even remember what group I got it from but this particular business owner allowed this behavior to continue for probably a lot of reasons. She was running short this and that and she hired on an individual. First of all, you are the business owner, you are the business owner.

Speaker 1: 10:50

I am the owner, jamie's the owner. You are the business owner. You're the person in charge when you have someone who has taken your, because they mentioned it says that she went around to all the other employees and complained about what an awful boss she was to them, and then this poor business owner had to defend herself, which wouldn't normally have to happen. But this is the I hate to say, this is the mentality of the workforce sometimes. So not only did this business owner allow this behavior, at the very end they had a bad party because she didn't take control of the situation. So one of the first things you do after you train them and things are great and they've been with you a year or two and blunders will happen because it's a human-based industry. Year or two and blunders will happen because we're it's a human based industry, thanks. Anytime I had to pay out money because you damaged something, depending on the costs would depend on whether I fired you for it. If I had had prior issues with you damaging things and I had to pay out again, I probably would have written you up, depending on the value of and the circumstance, or I would have just cut you loose. But there's a trail. So you have a one, two, three strikes, you are out. It sounds to me like this person ran the show, gossiped about everybody, which I would not allow, because once you have one negative Nancy and if your name is Nancy, it's not that I hate you, I'm just your name came up, it's like Karen, right, um, a sane right, right. So if you're a negative Nancy, you are going to contaminate the rest of the crew. And once you contaminate the rest of the crew, it's going to be hard for you to control them. Not that you're wanting to dominate their thoughts or their feelings or any of that stuff, but you have schedules to run. There is an expectation You're paying their payroll taxes, you're paying the workman's comp, you're paying the general liability and the marine insurance and all the other stuff that goes along with having a legit business. And then you have this one in a person who is rude, entitled and horrible at communicating. So that would be the first thing that I would have written this person up for hey, or I would have given them a verbal, depending on where we were in the relationship If someone pops off to me and says something offensive to me or feels that they're entitled to so much more than what I've already overgiven them. And then they can't communicate. You're either going to get a verbal or you're going to get written up and how that should work. And, jamie, you've done this a couple times. Yes, you have to write them. Hopefully you have an employee handbook. If not, I'm going to tell you right now I'm taking it down. I swear to God, I'm going to do it. Go inside of the maids network, go to the guides. There are two or three employee handbags that are not mine that you can download and you can copy and paste. Make it's free. It's going to be up there for a little bit longer. Take advantage of it If it's not there when you go to look. Then it got taken down because I swear, I've said for three years now I'm going to take it all down and take it all down, and then I haven't done it. So there has to be a documentation process.

Speaker 1: 14:09

And let's say you documented this individual who was rude and titled and horrible at communicating, and then two weeks later you have another issue of the same type that happens. You need to sit that person down and say hey, susan, whatever your name is, I just want to check in. I've noticed. You know we talked about this two weeks ago and we're here talking about it again. Is everything okay at home?

Speaker 1: 14:33

And this is your time to ask what the root of the problem is. Sometimes they've gotten thrown out of their house. Other times they were in recovery and they've relapsed. Other times they're going through a divorce. Or one time you guys have all heard me mention Rebecca, whose mom died from breast cancer and I didn't even know until the very end and I felt bad because I didn't ask, and that's the reason why I bring up her story. She was a very sweet girl and I talk about my mommy bear episode with the lady who I got mad at because she yelled at Rebecca and I was like oh yeah, right, yeah, he pulled off the job and I stuck the middle finger out when we got in the car and they're like you're the best boss ever.

Speaker 1: 15:17

Yes, I need a timeout, I'm not the best boss ever. So it's, when you get to that point, there should be some sort of documentation. So at that point you're talking to Sarah or Susan or whatever her name is, and she's telling you hey, I'm having problems at home, things haven't been that great. And then they vomit everything out because someone finally has asked. And then you have to decide whether you're going to put up with that behavior. Unfortunately, because you've had, I've given you a verbal here. I'm going to have to write you up here. However, I'm willing to give you a review about this in 90 or 30 days and if money comes into the whole thing, oh, you don't get. You don't tip me, I don't make enough money. I don't do this. Do not overcompensate by giving them more money.

Speaker 2: 16:04

They have to. Yes, because now you're rewarding their bad behavior and they're thinking it's okay and you're continuously still getting locked on or being talked bad to.

Speaker 1: 16:19

I do this with my birds because they start making noise when I'm cooking dinner and they know that I'm making steak and they want a piece of steak, so I'll walk over and give him a piece of steak. So every time now I'm guilty of this myself Every time I cook steak they're like hey, hey, hey, Don't, don't do what I'm doing there, Take it. You know, don't take everything to heart, but you have to start to document them and it's uncomfortable. Nobody likes to be the bad guy. I've been fired myself from jobs I think three jobs I can think of. I've fired hundreds of people because I've worked in large corporate entities where we just it just was part of the job.

Speaker 2: 16:58

It's part of the gig, especially whenever you start to hire. That's part of the whole gig.

Speaker 1: 17:07

And then the second issue that we should address, I think, is the she told me Sunday she went away for this weekend and can't make it to work on Monday. She went away for this weekend and can't make it to work on Monday. If you have someone who knows that you're going to do the schedule on Sunday and says you can't make it on Monday, don't schedule me, say you know I'm going to do it for you this time but I can't do it for you next time, or no, I need you to come in. But that's another opportunity to write them up. You want to get the three strikes you're out so that you can push them out the door. If you don't have the documentation, they're going to go to unemployment and they're going to file and you're going to get dinged. And if you have too many dings, then your state contribution is going to go up, and it does go up based on how many you have. Each and every year goes up or down, that's that's great info.

Speaker 2: 17:51

Right there is letting us know, letting the audience know that when somebody goes to unemployment, what that process looks like. You know, I think a lot of us are very nervous about that.

Speaker 1: 18:10

You can debate it all the way. They'll usually send you a notification email and you need to. The whole point is you have 30 days to respond. You want to make sure that you respond expediently. That's going to have to take over whatever you had planned for that day. Boom, you have to attach all the paperwork. Then you have to mail it in. Sometimes I'll let you email it in. I think we've gotten better. I would like to think that we've progressed to at least 2020 by now, but for those of you who are not watching, I just made a sad face. So make sure you submit that paperwork because you don't want to give them an you don't want to reward more bad behavior.

Speaker 1: 18:46

Sometimes people are just. Sometimes it can't be helped and they do get unemployment, but it's your unemployment. Hypothetically it's based on a percentage that you kick into the escrow account that the state holds for you because you're paying for unemployment tax. So you're paying. You as an employer are paying. Hypothetically, 7.5% is your kick in and then the employee pays in the other 7.5%, so that's 15% that gets kicked into this escrow account in whatever state you work in. Hypothetically the numbers are going to vary from state to state. Other states are going to have an 18%. A couple of states I can think of have a 22% kick in. It just depends on where you're at and do I know every state?

Speaker 2: 19:29

No, Very important for you to know those. It's very important for you to know that, and if not, you need to reach out to somebody that can explain that a little bit better to you.

Speaker 1: 19:44

And I would also dread the phone calls of the person who suddenly wasn't getting enough hours because they refused to work and then they went to the welfare office. I refuse to answer those calls. That just sucked, because then they want you to provide them with all this documentation. Stop what you're doing and provide me with all this stuff so that this person can get on welfare because they don't want to come into work. And I'm not saying that that's everyone. There's just a certain select few people who work a little bit, take all the PTO and then apply for you know social services, because that's just what they do and you don't know. When you hire them they don't say, they don't volunteer the information. Hi, I'm going to work for about seven days and then I'm going to take all my PTO because I'm retired, I'm required, you're required to give it to me right away, and then I'm going to go down and apply for unemployment and social services and I'm going to repeat the cycle for the next five people that are suckers enough to hire me. Yeah, no.

Speaker 2: 20:41

Yeah, I believe I hired somebody right at the tail end in December and they had kids and I believe that they hadn't worked all year and I was like, okay, I'll take I was you know start to question it. I'll hire. I'll hire you thinking I'm doing this great thing and helping this mom out and you know, two weeks later she quit. And I'm just thinking. As I started thinking about it, I was like you know, it was pretty. I wonder if she did that work just long enough to get that earned income tax credit.

Speaker 1: 21:29

Right, we don't have to go into detail. No, no, no, hey, if you're a mom and you need social services, I'm not saying that it's bad to go. Those are there for a reason it's a support system to protect you so that you don't end up totally destitute with mouths to feed.

Speaker 2: 21:49

But what I'm talking about are the serial ones. Yes, it's temporary. It's temporary. It's not supposed to be long term, so relied on and, um, you know, if you're making 26, 27 an hour, you know that that whatever they give you I don't know 400 in food stamps or something isn't always worth it. You know you can choose your battles but, yeah, the audience needs to know, um, how to how to make sure to protect your company and protect the negativity that's going to come, whether they're a great cleaner or not, whether they're a great cleaner or not, make sure that your core values and everything's aligning good.

Speaker 2: 22:46

I always tell my new applicants which I just put out that I need to hire again and I tell my applicants that you know, I need to know that it's going to be a good fit for the company. Not just, you know here's a job and and my, my, my application is lengthy. You know I really want to know and some people just look at it and be like you're just a cleaning company. I didn't know it was going to be like this.

Speaker 1: 23:21

Thanks for coming in.

Speaker 1: 23:23

Next so um, and if you have someone who's mouthy to you, like this person who complained and said this job gives her underpaid vibes, pull them to the side. You know it could be without airshot. Hey, I just was concerned about what you said to me. Or, if you're on, if you happen to be out working in the field and you're on the shift, do not say anything until the end of the day so that you don't screw yourself, shoot yourself in the foot and then you have to finish the job by yourself because so-and-so had a meltdown. How do you know that, shannon? I was speaking from experience.

Speaker 2: 23:58

I made the mistake of that doing that one time I had a cleaning tech.

Speaker 1: 24:02

We were moving out of the Chino Valley house back into town here in where I'm living now, and I had some. My husband was. We were getting the tail end of everything cleaned up and my husband said something to one of the cleaning techs who was male, and he got offended and this person did not drive and I also had other jobs going on that I had a bid and like I had like 15 things scheduled that day all on a very small window, and so I had to drive this individual all the way back home because he there was no taxi service out there and, um, there was no uber, so I had to drive this person home. He couldn't walk home.

Speaker 2: 24:41

It's there's the stretch highway. It's 20 miles long. Yes, you can't walk, they can't walk you're like trying to do a hundred to the next place right.

Speaker 1: 25:18

So then it's like you're trying to rush back to finish all the other things, but he he put me behind Because he's like you know your husband said something that was really offensive. I'm like I heard the whole exchange of what was offensive about it and it would just had triggered something in his mind and I'm like I'm really sorry this isn't going to work out and I, like you know, I pad money for him at the end of the week. But I've done that. If you have someone who smarts off to you, suck it up until the end of the day and then at the end of the day call them out on it with a big old smile on your face, put the nice poker face on.

Speaker 2: 25:55

Well, nowadays it's you know, I see that it's all through text. They have a lot of things to say to you through text nowadays and it's just like oh gosh, yeah, document, document, document.

Speaker 1: 26:10

So that's, that's my suggestion. If you have someone who smarts off, if you're still on the field with your crew and you have one, and remember, if you don't do something about it, the others they'll all, they'll all, they'll all talk, and then like she has no power. If it's not that big of a deal, anyone can run a cleaning company and blah, blah, blah, and then it just like again negative nancy, and we have. We had a no gossiping clause where you had to be positive and there was no gossiping. If you had something to say and you couldn't say it into their face, then you didn't need to say anything at all.

Speaker 2: 26:42

We just implemented that. In, in in with our company. Everybody had a sign no, no gossiping, no gossiping.

Speaker 1: 26:53

And then the next thing that they mentioned is she never tells me until she needs, until after the schedule is made. So you have time off requests. If you have not gotten a hold of one of those forms, you can probably Pinterest it. It's called a time off request. They have to submit it either digitally to you or hand it in the old fashioned way and there is no guarantee that you will get that time off. If you have W-2s, if you have 1099s, you can't do this, but it's a time off request. It's not guaranteed.

Speaker 1: 27:25

Like when I got hired on at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I also had grandfathered in two 25-year employees of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. One of them came with a handwritten note. Her name was Connie. I loved her. She was a very distinguished older woman, woman. But the caveat with Connie was at the Christmas holiday, the busiest time for any retail. She, she had a grandfathered in the time off and I'm like why do I have to have? Why do I have to work extra? Because she can't? She can't help out, manage, Right, because they had grandfathered it. They had allowed this employee for 25 years. It was handwritten from like 1982. It was laminated. She'd whip it out every once in a while, but it was handwritten by some manager who was there like I don't know.

Speaker 2: 28:23

25 years ago. Paddle on it. Paddle on it like it's an auctioneer.

Speaker 1: 28:28

Right. It just was like it was an awful position. So they didn't, the upper management didn't set me up for success at that store and then that person was like, went around telling everybody how she was going away for the holiday and no one else was allowed to be gone. So it's that again. It's that negative, nancy. So then there is the whole tipping thing. Another aspect tipping is not required. I know that we have become this huge tipping society and I think it's great when it's genuinely deserved. Anybody who knows what tipping means to ensure promptness, providing good service. If you're not doing either one of those, don't put your hand out.

Speaker 2: 29:10

Just don't put it, Just don't put your hand out.

Speaker 1: 29:12

Anyway, you know it's really frustrating because they in Arizona I don't know if it happens in California, where you're at they get a low in a restaurant. They get. They can pay a lower wage if they're tipped. So then everybody's tipped, right, because they don't want to pay the upper wages, and I get that too. But it just comes to where do you stop with the tipping thing? So if you're promising tips to your cleaning techs, it's great, but it's not guaranteed in the industry. On a normal occasion occasion, typically, you're going to get a tip at a one-time cleaning or more towards the end of the year, and this is talked extensively in the black friday bonanza. Um, about tipping and all that other stuff. So right, let's make sure that they understand, be realistic.

Speaker 2: 29:58

You know, if you have, they don't have to tip it's not no, and and we we, as the business owners, prefer that we're not involved at all cash like, please give them cash. If you are going to tip, um, some of them will tip. I and I don't even know about it, which is great. I love that. I don't know. But, uh, she got her son, uh, this huge Hot Wheels thing and it was just perfect for the perfect age he's like eight and that was like a huge, it was like a $200 huge box and it sat in our office, which is our storage, in our storage, which is the office, forever. She was waiting for the right time to pull it out and I didn't even register, because I go and check in on it every now and again to see you know what supplies we need, and it was just like well, wait, where'd that?

Speaker 2: 30:59

come from oh, such and such gave that to me as a tip. Can you believe that? And I was just like that's so awesome, I love that, I love it.

Speaker 1: 31:07

So yes, it is awesome, but it's a great area. So if you're telling your W-2s that you get tipped, try to be as realistic as possible with them. Yeah, tipping does happen. It is encouraged. It's mentioned in the onboarding paperwork. It's mentioned digitally and paper. It's meant it's. We have an extra line item on the credit card receipt. We try to provide opportunities but again, as a business owner, I'd prefer not to know because I don't want to ding you. The government already takes enough of what we make. I don't want you to get dinged again because you got a tip.

Speaker 2: 31:41

Yeah, and I still can't wrap my head around that it's like okay, but yeah, it's not as common because we are charging in those upper prices. It's not as common as you think it is, especially if you're digital. So you got to train your clients too, you know. So everybody knows that it's not expected, yeah, so.

Speaker 1: 32:12

And then what is the last thing? Okay, so according to this screenshot that I made, it says she won't do apartments because it's too much carry. Now some of you are in sprawling urban epicenters, florida for example, miami, south Beach, apartments everywhere.

Speaker 1: 32:30

So if you have a cleaner that is in that type of situation, you need to cluster all of your clients together so that they're in the same apartment building for the day, right, so they all are working in the day. Okay, we're going to be at 303 Miami Boulevard today and make it easy, because it can be a challenge, especially if you're not allowed to park on site. You've got to huff it four or five blocks. New York comes to mind when I think of these. Make it realistic for your cleaning techs, if you like. I had someone who lived on a hill and they had this beautiful house. They had a seat. They still have the house. It has a 350 degree view of the whole valley and it's up on the hill, but they're driveways where, as you know, mountain houses have weird driveways.

Speaker 1: 33:22

So I, that she the the wife was a little persnickety and um, I let one of the cleaning techs take my my car and, um, we, we put it over to the side where it was supposed to be parked. Well, she did. And then, um, the cleaning tech came out and there's this huge dent in the door and there's no, no, another car, separate cars. So she had back the reason why she didn't explain this to the cleaning and there's this huge dent in the door and there's no other cars separate from the cars. So she had backed the reason why she didn't explain this to the cleaning tech, the reason why she wanted you to park over to the side is so that when she backed out, she didn't hit your car because she had been notorious for hitting other people's cars. Like why didn't you just fucking say something? So the cleaning tech had to come back and say your car got hit. I was like what? It was far, you had to park far away. Once you know the why behind. Okay, I want you to park.

Speaker 1: 34:12

And it was a little bit of a hike for the cleaning tech to take all the gear and bring it into the house, right, it wasn't a lot of work, but when you're by yourself carrying all the stuff, it can be, and so that was the reason why, with apartment buildings, sometimes you have to park off site because there's not enough permits, sometimes you have to park in the person's parking spot, sometimes there's elevator. I mean, there's a lot of reasons and things that go on with urban living that people who live in rural areas we don't think about a lot of times because we're like yeah, but I would also like to know you know what are you providing your W-2s to make sure that they're successful?

Speaker 2: 34:49

I seen that you made a post about you know people up and down, how many steps, how much we walk in a day? Or you know the cleaning techs walk in a day is sometimes 300 or three miles Because you're up down, up down. Make sure that their equipment is specific to the area that you're getting ready to go to.

Speaker 2: 35:16

Don't give them the the huge vacuum, and I don't know, don't give them a whole huge tote to tote up to these apartments, or you know, or this you got to have to scale down their kit so that they can realistic.

Speaker 1: 35:35

You're not setting them up for success by not providing them the right tools. And it is true, on average, most house cleaners walk three miles in a normal size home. We have a couple of large homes and I checked in with the cleaning tech. One is 5,555 square feet. She walks seven miles in that house every two weeks. Yeah, we have another one that's 7,800. That is a 10 mile day. 10 miles. Not to mention if you think about if you high dust all the rooms. Usually most rooms have four corners, right. So if you have 22 rooms, 22 times four is what, right?

Speaker 1: 36:13

so you're lifting your arm up to go around and high dust, then then you're taking your arms down and you're hitting the baseboards, right, because these are both monthlies, so there's a lot of bending over and you know. Then you're moving gear as you go right, or you're shoving it in your apron. I'm hoping you're wearing an apron. It makes you faster, but these are things One of your biggest tools, right? I love wearing an apron when I was cleaning because I didn't have to keep going back to the cleaning caddy and like who was I talking to about that? I can't remember, but these are some of the things to do, for when you have an employee who is not doing well, you need to call them out verbally.

Speaker 1: 37:27

Hey, I noticed, this happened today. Or you said this what do you mean? They'll usually squirm, usually, and then you give them a verbal and then you go to your calendar. Please do this. Don't come to me after the fact and go. I didn't write it down. Put in your Google Calendar. I spoke to Susan regarding this.

Speaker 1: 37:43

This is what the outcome was, because I guarantee and I'm just as bad you will not remember six months from now what exactly you said to this individual. And then you won't remember and then this unemployment claim will come up and you'll be like oh, so then the second time, if it's the same type of thing, you're going to write them up. It's going to be formal, and if you don't operate out of an office, you need to go to a public place and you need to have someone who can witness this for you, whether that's your second neighbor, an other elite or whatever, because if you don't and it goes ugly, you won't have a witness over what's going on. Do not fire someone in your home. If you run your business out of your home, don't, don't do it. And you know, you just don't know what's going on in the minds of people nowadays. There's a lot of things that just people just get triggered.

Speaker 2: 38:37

Right, and we, we, we have a new law here, and then this is in California where we have violence, workplace violence in the workplace, documentation, documentation and what we have to do. We have to let our employees know if something like takes place and is just a whole.

Speaker 1: 39:02

So you know, then you would. And if it continually is a problem, even after you've addressed it there just comes to the point where you have to cut them loose. You have to cut them loose and I'm all about doing it with as much dignity as possible. Do not shame anyone. Take it from me. I've had to fire hundreds, probably thousands of people in my lifetime. You just want to give them as much dignity. This is not shaming. Sometimes we make good employees. I think when I was younger how cocky I was. I'm sure I was just like full of myself, right, but you just you don't know. You don't know what you don't know. So try to give them as much dignity as possible. Try to have a paper trail. It's three strikes.

Speaker 1: 39:41

You're out in most States. Um, here in Arizona you could, I could just show up and the sun is not sitting in the right way and they could fire me right. So they can at least circumstantial, so that they understand what they did wrong, so that they can learn from that and grow as an employee and maybe become their own boss at one point. And it kind of moves along. But just for your own safety sake and I talk about this a lot safety on the workforce do not fire someone in your home. Do it in a public place If you don't have one, that you know. Starbucks is a great place, not my favorite place, but it works when you can say, okay, I just, and you just make it a very formal. Here's the paperwork. You slide the paperwork over. They sign it. Here's your last check. Make sure you check with your state to see what, if you fire someone, some states require that you pay them right then. And there Some require 72 hours.

Speaker 2: 40:35

It just depends on your state, right.

Speaker 1: 40:37

And that she had said what was the other thing? Cash. Oh, here we go. It says. The other girls accused me of stealing money and I told her she probably put the account in the wrong info and I asked her to verify. Instead of doing that, she called me, saying names to me, and told me to pay her cash. Do not, do not pay someone cash and I'll tell you why. You ready, yes?

Speaker 2: 41:03

I am. I'm a real client in all ears.

Speaker 1: 41:05

Sometimes you just get so sick of whatever drama this person's going through and they're like you, freaking, owe me 400 bucks, and you happen to have 200 for groceries Cause you're going to go to the grocery store later, and so you give them 200 bucks and you don't have anyone to witness the transaction. What did you just do? Oh, you just, yeah, you just gifted them 200 bucks. So cash, no cash. It has to be in a company check, because what will happen? Or you'll give them the cash and you won't make them sign anything and they'll go down to the unemployment office, or it's online now you don't have to go down right yeah, no, and they'll say she never paid me.

Speaker 1: 41:45

And then the unemployment office will say I have so-and-so saying that you never paid them, and you're like, yes, I did. I gave them money out of my wallet. Did you get a receipt? No, what happened then? You gave them a gift.

Speaker 2: 42:00

And if you don't think this can happen to you, like, oh never, I am here to tell you I wish I had taken heed a long time ago from what Shannon was telling me, and she was at this point. She was like, well, whatever You're, just I did have to figure this out on my own. They do, they eventually do, right, right, so don't I? Just, you know, something happens along the way, years down the road, something happens to where the relationship has soured. And if you don't think that people don't do this, these kinds of things, they do so just and they're repeat offenders and it happens all.

Speaker 1: 42:46

They just go from place to place to place. So do not give cash. Now the caveat with that you can give them cash if they sign a piece of paper that says I received cash for final payment. You can do that. Sometimes you have a situation that's so ugly you just want to get rid of them and get them out of your face. You can pay them out in cash and it said you have to write last and final pay received on whatever today's date is, and they have to sign it and you have to sign it. If you give them the cash and you don't get the signature, you just gave them a gift.

Speaker 2: 43:25

Well, nowadays, too, they have all this. They got Venmo, facebook pays um. That is a small form of documentation, but not the right form, right, not the right form.

Speaker 1: 43:41

Still have somebody sign something somewhere make sure it says last and final pay, because if you don't put that on there, you forget or whatever, because you're first time doing it. They can come back and say well, it was, it didn't say my last and final pay. I want the rest of my pay and they'll come. I've had people make up things like hey, just take it, just go away, I don't want to talk anymore. So that is what I have to say about that. So that is what. Those are some of the steps that you have to do before you can fire a W-2.

Speaker 1: 44:17

1099s I'll give you a really quick rundown of what it is. 1099s are great because they're their own entities, so you could pull them off your schedule at any given time because you're not really using them that way per se. I would like to believe Sometimes they have their own established clientele with you and that's a whole different story, but at any given time you can just part ways. It's just part of the process. Hey, thanks for doing the job. I really appreciate you doing a great job. If anything else should come up, let me know. And that's it. You're not obligated to give them hours because they are not your employees.

Speaker 2: 44:55

Please don't make them like your employees. Right, yeah, yeah. Separate the two.

Speaker 1: 45:01

W-2, 1099, you know, I think almost everybody unless you're a big entity is working a hybrid. So they have some W-2s and they have a couple 1099s, and that's just the way the market is right now. Do I? Is it the most perfect thing? No, in the ideal world I would like to have all W-2s or all of the other, but in the real world I do a hybrid every now and again, right, just because you're coming, you don't have a job.

Speaker 2: 45:34

I need to do this. I can, you know, pay you at the end of the day and yeah, exactly, and I'm always willing to hire at 1099, but you have to be your own business with your own insurance, your own everything. Yeah, so we do that.

Speaker 1: 45:49

That's, that's what we do here too. Definitely, and I I'm a really big sickler on the insurance piece, me too. If you cannot, if you can't do the insurance for whatever reason, then you don't have any skin in the game and I don't think that you're serious. That's just the reality. And sometimes you are serious, but you're given a certain amount of time to get it together, to get the insurance. You can't run six months ago. I'm not, I didn't, you know, I didn't do it this way.

Speaker 2: 46:15

I yeah, I've always. It's just like that was the first. I mean, the first second that I got some sort of money from working myself as a solo cleaner was the first thing I went and did and I documented the whole way through and they're like oh, thank you for the shout out Because I so excited, like I'm doing this, like I am opening, and it just grew from there. But, yeah, I don't need to cost that much. Really, the down payment is probably the most expensive thing. So you know, for those of you who don't know.

Speaker 1: 46:54

Typically, when you first get insurance, depending on what entity you go with, there is a balloon payment and that is how your insurance agent if you have one gets their commission, and then then you have subsequent monthly payments until it's paid, and then you go through an unpleasant audit. They always say it's going to take five minutes. It never does, Even if you organize and have all your stuff together.

Speaker 2: 47:16

Yeah Well, and you hear that word audit, and at first it's like wait, why? Why am I getting audit Like you get? You just do every part of the process. Everyone gets it. You get it at the end of the year and it's no big deal now.

Speaker 1: 47:32

And it's based on your growth. So if you're a new company and you have a huge growth spurt, you're going to pay more in insurance. I can't tell you how many times I come across like why do I have to pay more? I'm like because you had, you didn't have more to insure, Right? It's just like with the audit. They're looking for more money, so they want you know they they'll cover you, hypothetically speaking, but you technically operated out of the realm of what your normal coverage is, so they need to increase you so that the following year you make sure that you always have enough coverage. Yeah, yes, and thus this concludes. I'm thinking, unless you have it, no, I think this is great.

Speaker 2: 48:11

I I'm gonna get working on it right now.

Speaker 1: 48:14

Saturday. It's Saturday, saturday Saturday, yeah, so this is the short version of what went down with this individual. Hopefully, some of these antidotes will lead you on the path to where you're going and that you don't have someone who says I have underpaid vibes, who says that you give me underpaid vibes.

Speaker 2: 48:39

Underpaid vibes, all right. Yes, see, you See, ya, bye.