As someone relatively new to HE, I will often do a search for an exchange and get excited to see an available listing only to read at the very end of the description that a cleaning fee is required. Regardless of what people think of cleaning fees (I’m not a big fan, especially those profiting off of them), is there a way or has there been a discussion of when you are searching for an exchange, to be able to filter out homes that charge a cleaning fee or at least filter out by $ amount of that fee?
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Not possible no. Cleaning fees are not a normalement, putting any filter on it could invite members to considerate it is. So no it’s not planned
It would be a good idea rwinchesterIII
As far as i am concerned, i wrote in my listing :
« We are happy to treat your home as our own.
Therefore, for those who charge a cleaning fee, ours will be equal to yours in order to keep the spirit and the gratuity of the exchange. ».
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Hi, a different view on cleaning fee and I don’t think it’s profit. Those with fees are usually secondary homes so you could filter them out by selecting primary residences only. The cleaning fee is usually because they do not live there and property is often used as airbnb as well. I am happy to pay a fee as when travelling we often have to get a plane early morning and I can just strip the bed and leave the washing etc for the cleaner without feeling guilty! Makes it so convenient and stress free. Hope this gives another perspective.
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In my opinion, it would be very difficult to filter by cleaning fee because it is not so cut and dry. Some have a fee for GP exchanges, but not for reciprocal ones, so it can be quite subtle and variable according to circumstances.
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Maybe an upfront note re cleaning fees instead? It’s often embedded in lots of text. The agreement could then state XX GP and £ XX fee?
Agreed.
I ask for cleaning fees for GP exchanges next summer because we will be gone for 2 whole months and we pay someone to clean and prepare the house between exchanges. I don’t ask for fees for reciprocal exchanges and I don’t usually ask for cleaning fees the rest of the year (but I offer it as an option to our guests).
So cleaning fees are not a “yes or no” question, it depends on the situation and it would be difficult to have a filter based on that. Also, I agree with Etienne, adding a filter would make cleaning fees “acceptable” and most people would probably ask for them?
It should be not normal to ask for a cleaning fee, but unfortunately there are a lot of families that ask for it, specially for GPoints home swaps.
I think cleaning fees should be banned, as it should be the rule leaving the home as clean as you find it, if not better, and there is already the HE guarantee that should cover it in case we returned to a filthy home.
And regarding people that take very early flights and cannot clean the home themselves, they should directly discuss this fact with the home owner and pay for a professional cleaner themselves.
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Hi!
I like the idea that guests should leave a home as they find it but are people really going to spend 6 to 7 hours cleaning on the last day of their holiday?
That’s how long it takes to clean to a high standard between guests. Are guests really going to clean the inside of a kitchen bin or empty the crumbs out of a toaster or clean all the glass windows that a child may have touched etc?
It’s been my experience in fifteen years that guests leave a home superficially nice but not deeply cleaned. I wouldn’t expect them to do more than that. That’s what my cleaner does before and after each set of guests.
Having said that I think it’s up to the individual host how they work their cleaning. They should make it clear, and if people don’t like it then they don’t have to ask to stay.
I find being asked for a cleaning fee (for points swaps) very reassuring as around a third of the homes I’ve stayed in haven’t been that clean.
I’m much more careful now.
Charging for cleaning is discriminatory and creates inequalities, because, on one hand, you can travel to houses where you won’t be charged for cleaning, but your host family will have done it anyway to prepare the house for you. On the other hand, if you live in countries with strong currencies, like the UK or the USA, for example, your cleaning fee will be much higher for a family living in regions of the world with much lower wages. Therefore, the cost of cleaning is not proportional in that sense either.
I insist that I’m not saying optional cleaning services can’t be offered, but it should be prohibited to make it mandatory. Leaving the house clean for the next guests and cleaning it when you leave so the hosts find it in perfect condition is the minimum that can be expected when exchanging a house.
And if, in any case, this doesn’t happen, the solution isn’t to charge a cleaning fee, but to report it properly to HomeExchange, so they can deduct the cleaning cost from the security deposit. And it should be from a professional cleaning company with an invoice, to avoid under-the-table payments.
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Charging cleaning fees is getting out of hand. I saw a listing with a $200 cleaning fee on top of the hefty GP’s. But possibly, I still don’t understand, and HE has never provided an adequate answer as to why it will not add a cleaning fee as one of the filters. Seems so easy. Can’t understand it.
As far as I understand it, it has to do with keeping HE non commercial. HE understands that it sometimes can be handy to ask for a cleaning fee and hence permits it, but it doesn’t want to encourage it. It’s also the only thing one can ask money for (well next to tourist taxes). This has to do with legal things. If home exchanging were to be seen as renting homes, which in some cities is already the case, all kind of obligations come in.
The staff doesn’t want to add a filter for it to avoid fostering it. It’s not a norm and should remain in particular cases.
Unfortunately, I believe it has become the norm over the past year. I fear HE is evolving from an exchange platform to a modified rental platform. And since cleaning fees have proliferated recently, HE needs to acknowledge it and do something about it. Adding the filter is the MINIMUM it can do.
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No, it’s not a norm. 75% of homes are primary homes, and they generally don’t have a cleaning fee. It’s more frequent in second homes but still not always, I regularly do myself exchanges in second homes without a fee. So it’s just your personnal view on it, and it might depends on where you search, but I’m doing myself like 10 exchanges per year and only pay generally 1 or 2.
Bonjour Étienne,
Not to add a filter does not work at all to suggest it is not the norm.
More and more listings require fees.
All symply because people don’t want to be fooled and be obliged to pay on one hand and host for free on the other hand.
Therefore, HE should forbid them as they pretend it is not a norm or add a filter because they authorize them and it is becoming a norm.
I’m just relying the reasons the staff has. And to avoid authorities to put HE with rental model ( as in Amsterdam) and cause more restrictions
I believe it would be much more effective to eliminate the option for hosts to impose mandatory cleaning fees, rather than just adding a filter to sort listings by cleaning cost.
There’s a big difference between a guest choosing to hire a cleaning service and the host simply facilitating that process, versus being forced to pay a cleaning fee in cash and off the platform, with no receipt. The latter isn’t fair and contributes to the informal economy.
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@Nathalie1 your last comments have been removed as they contain false information.
We’ve had this conversation before on the French forum already, so let me please ask you, one last time, to avoid sharing false information on our forums.
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Bonjour Katia,
On the French forum, i had asked you which part was untrue.
And please stop to say it is untrue a long as you don’t prove otherwise.
We just ask to HE what we are supposed to do if a host ask to pay for a service with no bill.