I don't usually leave negative reviews because I find them kind of pointless and somewhat cruel. I usually only leave good reviews unless something really stands out as bad. Most issues can be resolved by talking to a business owner, and I don't believe in leaving bad reviews to "punish" businesses. It's hard enough to be a business owner, honestly. But I felt that I should post my experience with Clean Arrival here because I chose them based on their good reviews, and I thought other potential customers should hear a not-so-great experience.
I had Clean Arrival clean my house about 3 or 4 times. They did an... OK to kind of bad job each time. I would give their cleaning quality overall 2.5 stars, maybe 3. I'd notice areas of the floor that were a slightly different color because they'd only mopped in the center of the room, not the entire thing. There would be spots on the floor from before the cleaning that just never got cleaned. I'd find dust bunnies in corners after they left, they never moved items on shelves to dust under them, there were cobwebs on my (low-hanging, not ceiling) kitchen lights, the list goes on and on.
These are things that just shouldn't happen when you're paying what feels like a lot of money to have a house cleaned. I'm a nice Italian girl from the east coast who loves cleaning her own house, lol, but I also have a disability and can't do it anymore. This is hard for me. So I told myself every cleaner misses things and I just had super high standards.
But then my duster went missing. My husband and I started to move into our house in September -- but only began living here full-time around Thanksgiving. We just got married, so lots of items were being sent to the house from our registry. One of these items was the duster. It's an OXO duster, fancy, you know the kind. It went missing one day. Well, with COVID, we've had no one in our house but cleaners, so naturally I thought a cleaner from Clean Arrival accidentally packed it in with their stuff. I reached out to Alice, the owner, and asked her if this was possible and if she could check. She politely agreed to check, but stated shortly after that she couldn't find it among her vans. That's fine. I was pretty positive it got taken accidentally, but it's not a big deal, so I let it go. I definitely don't think anyone took it intentionally, for the record. The cleaners I had seemed very nice. It's just that items don't walk out of people's houses.
Had another cleaning that was... OK. It was before Christmas and we baked the cleaners cookies. They were nice, as they always were, but not thorough. Aside from the usual dust bunnies in corners, I noticed after they left that there was what looked like a bleach spot, or a spot of white discoloration, on the bathroom rug we just got off of our registry. These were nice Crate and Barrel rugs from our registry, and I was annoyed. I don't use bleach or any non-color safe cleaner and I hadn't cleaned since we got the rugs, just a few short days before. I reached out to Alice again and told her, politely, that I think a cleaner accidentally stained our new rug. She didn't offer to replace the rug. She replied that it's not possible, that they don't use non-color safe cleaners either. I understand that, but it's also simply not possible that this happened another way. Stranger things have happened, but this one was just not possible from any other source. So I didn't let it go this time: I requested a refund on the item, $35. I thought that was more than fair.
I also decided at her initial refusal that the subpar cleaning, inattention to detail, and making off with my stuff was enough and I reached out to other cleaners. I planned to inform her of this on Monday, but before I could I got an email from Alice stating, "We greatly appreciate your business, but I believe at this point our services are not the best fit for your needs and we will not be able to continue services." (It should be noted, Clean Arrival did offer to refund me $35 to replace the rug in that same email.)
This was the most bizarre message I'd ever received from a business owner. Who decides that replacing a $35 rug is grounds to terminate a business relationship with a client who is always kind, polite, and bakes your cleaners cookies? It was downright creepy. If I was hostile, demanding, rude, I could definitely understand. As a business owner, I would -- and have -- cut off customers who are abusive. But if a client politely states they know for a fact that an item was damaged by your cleaners and the item is $35, is it worth losing hundreds of dollars, thousands over years? Ultimately, this act is what made me write this review. I would caution anyone doing dealings with this company that their practices are, well, kind of unreasonable. read more
