The most common mistake first-time cleaning clients make is cleaning before the cleaner arrives. It feels logical – you do not want someone to see your mess – but it defeats the purpose of hiring help and costs you cleaning time you have already paid for.
Here is what is actually useful to do before your cleaner arrives, why it matters, and what you can safely leave entirely to them.
The One Thing You Should Not Do: Pre-Clean
Your cleaner is a professional. They have seen every variation of household mess and are not there to judge – they are there to clean. Scrubbing the bathroom before they arrive, wiping down the kitchen, or vacuuming because you feel embarrassed is time you spend doing the exact work you hired someone else to do.
There is also a practical argument. Most professional cleaners charge by the visit or the hour. Industry data from cleaning professionals suggests that spending 15 minutes on the right preparation can save a cleaner 30 to 45 minutes of working around clutter – effectively giving you an extra room’s worth of cleaning from the same booking. Spending that 15 minutes on cleaning instead of preparing is the less efficient choice.
Clean the mess. Do not clean the cleanable.
What Actually Helps: 7 Steps That Make a Difference
1. Declutter Surfaces – Don’t Clean Them
There is an important distinction between decluttering and cleaning. Decluttering means clearing items off surfaces so your cleaner can access and clean them. It does not mean wiping those surfaces down first.
Kitchen: Clear benchtops of mail, appliances, random items. The cleaner can wipe down an empty benchtop efficiently. They cannot clean around a pile of things without moving them, which takes time.
Bathrooms: Remove personal hygiene items – toothbrushes, cosmetics, hair products – from vanity surfaces and shower caddies. An empty shower caddy allows for a proper scrub of the walls and fixtures. A cleared vanity can be fully sanitised.
Bedrooms: Clear floors of clothing. Pick up items that are on the floor and either put them away or move them to a basket. This allows the cleaner to vacuum properly rather than working around things on the floor.
General: Items left on floors, stairs, or in the middle of rooms slow down vacuuming and mopping and mean those areas receive less thorough attention.
2. Handle the Dishes
Dishes in the sink are not the cleaner’s job unless you have specifically asked them to do dishes as part of the scope. A sink full of dishes limits how thoroughly the kitchen can be cleaned and may mean your cleaner works around the sink rather than fully cleaning it.
Before your cleaner arrives: run the dishwasher, stack dishes to one side, or do a quick wash. This takes 5 to 10 minutes and frees the kitchen for a proper clean.
3. Sort the Laundry
Clothes on the bathroom floor, laundry piled on bedroom chairs, or washing on a drying rack in a room that needs vacuuming are all things that limit cleaning access without adding to the actual clean.
A quick sort before your cleaner arrives – clothes into the laundry, dry washing folded and out of the way – takes a few minutes and opens up the rooms that need the most attention.
If your cleaner includes bed making in their scope, stripping used sheets and having fresh ones nearby makes this task faster. Check with your provider whether bed making is part of your service.
4. Manage Your Pets
Pets are a common friction point in residential cleaning visits. Anxious dogs can make it difficult for a cleaner to move through rooms. Cats that sit on every surface being cleaned slow things down. And most professional cleaners – however much they may like animals – cannot do their best work while managing an animal that has not been introduced to the situation.
Before your cleaner arrives:
- Secure dogs in a room, the garden, or arrange a walk during the clean
- Inform your cleaner about any pets so they can be mindful when opening doors
- Put away pet toys, bowls, and food from the areas being cleaned
- If your pet is reactive to strangers or vacuum noise, remove them from the home if possible
On a recurring schedule, most pets adjust to the cleaner’s presence over time. The first visit or two is when management matters most.
5. Ensure Access – Including Parking
Your cleaner needs to be able to get in and get their equipment in.
Entry access: Confirm the key or code arrangement in advance. If you will not be home, leave clear access instructions. A cleaner who arrives and cannot get inside loses time that comes out of your clean.
Parking: Melbourne’s inner suburbs – Fitzroy, Carlton, Northcote, Richmond, South Yarra, Brunswick, and others – have notoriously limited street parking. If your home is in a suburb with timed or permit-only parking, let your cleaner or cleaning company know in advance. Many professional Melbourne cleaning companies factor this into their scheduling, but a heads-up avoids a wasted trip or a late start.
Clear access to all areas: If a room is locked or inaccessible, it cannot be cleaned. If there are areas you want cleaned but access needs organising (a key to a specific room, a code for a storeroom), sort that before the appointment.
6. Put Away Valuables and Fragile Items
Any item you would be upset to see broken or moved – jewellery, heirlooms, fragile ornaments, important documents – is worth putting away before a clean rather than leaving it on a surface.
This is not about distrust. It is about the practical reality of a cleaner working efficiently through a home, moving quickly around surfaces and shelves. Delicate items that stay on surfaces slow the clean down because the cleaner has to work carefully around them. Items that are put away do not get broken.
This matters most on the first visit. Once a cleaner is familiar with your home and its contents, they will know what to treat with care. For early visits, taking 5 minutes to secure fragile items is time well spent.
7. Communicate Your Priorities
This is the highest-value step for getting a clean that matches your expectations, and it is the one most people skip.
Professional cleaners work from a standard checklist. If there is an area of your home that needs particular attention – a bathroom that has not been cleaned in a while, a stovetop with stubborn residue, a room that gets more use than others – telling your cleaner specifically is the most direct way to make sure it gets addressed.
If you will be home when the cleaner arrives, a two-minute walkthrough pointing out your priorities takes very little time and makes a meaningful difference to the result. If you will not be home, leave a brief note or send a message to the cleaning company before the visit.
For recurring cleans, priorities tend to establish themselves over the first few visits. Most cleaners become familiar with the specific needs of your home and adjust their attention accordingly – but only if those needs have been communicated at some point.
💡 Clean & Co Note: Before every first visit, we ask clients to share any specific priorities or areas of concern. It is a two-minute conversation that shapes every subsequent clean. Our cleaners are assigned to the same home consistently so they build familiarity with your space – over time, you will not need to explain your priorities at each visit because they will already know. Book your first clean with Clean & Co and we will talk through what matters to you before anyone arrives.
First Visit vs Recurring Visits: Different Prep Required
For Your First Visit
The first professional clean of a home – particularly after a period without professional cleaning – requires a bit more preparation than a recurring visit.
Do the declutter steps above thoroughly. On a first visit, the cleaner is unfamiliar with your space and will be working through it systematically for the first time. Clear access across the whole home matters more on visit one than on visit ten.
Consider whether you have communicated the scope. If this is a deep clean, confirm in advance that all deep clean areas (inside oven, inside cupboards, window tracks) are accessible and any obvious blockages are moved.
Be available at the start, or leave very clear instructions. A brief introduction on the first visit – even just pointing out where things are – saves time and reduces guesswork. If you cannot be there, leave a written note or send a message covering access, pets, any fragile items, and your priority areas.
For guidance on what a cleaner covers in different time windows, see our post on what a cleaner should do in 2 hours.
For Recurring Visits
Once you are on a regular schedule, preparation becomes minimal. Most of the communication has happened. Your cleaner knows the space.
What still helps on every recurring visit:
- A quick surface declutter the night before (5 to 10 minutes)
- Dishes handled
- Laundry not on floors in rooms being vacuumed
- Pets managed
What you can stop worrying about: the state of the mess. That is the whole point of the service.
Should You Be Home During the Clean?
There is no requirement either way. Both approaches are common among Melbourne cleaning clients.
If you prefer to be home: You can point out priorities at the start, answer any questions, and do a quick walkthrough at the end. Some clients find being home for the first visit reassuring while they are establishing trust with a new cleaner.
If you prefer not to be home: This is the majority approach for recurring clients. A cleaner working in an empty home can often work more efficiently – no navigating around the occupants, no pausing for conversation. Ensure access is clearly arranged, priorities have been communicated in advance, and you have a way to give feedback after.
For clients who are home: give the cleaner space to work. Following them from room to room, redirecting them mid-task, or asking questions while they are mid-clean interrupts the workflow and extends the visit. If something needs addressing, mention it at the start or leave it for the end.
After the Clean: A Quick Feedback Loop
If something was not done to your standard, say so promptly. Most professional cleaning companies – including any operating with a satisfaction guarantee – will address a specific issue either on the next visit or, for significant misses, within 24 to 48 hours.
Vague feedback (“it was fine”) after a visit that did not meet your expectations does not improve the next one. Specific feedback (“the bathroom floor still had residue near the toilet base”) gives the cleaner something actionable. Most professional cleaners want to get it right and will adjust based on clear feedback.
For guidance on how to structure your regular cleaning arrangement – including the right frequency for your household – see our posts on how often to get your house professionally cleaned and the difference between regular and deep cleaning.
💡 Clean & Co Note: Every Clean & Co client receives the same cleaner on each visit – which means preparation gets simpler over time as the cleaner learns your home. We use eco-friendly, non-toxic products throughout, so there is nothing to remove from surfaces for safety reasons after we leave. Our 100% satisfaction guarantee means that if something was missed, we fix it. Explore our regular cleaning services and find out what an ongoing arrangement looks like for your home.