My cleaner keeps breaking stuff. What should I do?

[Huma0]

So, I spent most of my hosting years without a cleaner (really hard in London to find a good one) and finally found a lovely Brazilian couple who run their own small business (via a friend's recommendation). They are great, not the cheapest, but very fast and very thorough compared to most, so I feel it is worth it.

However, the past few months, they have assigned a very lovely lady to come clean my home. I like her a lot. She works hard. BUT, I feel like she is constantly breaking things. I am used to guests breaking/damaging things from time to time and sometimes, I cannot be 100% sure that the cleaner is the one who did it. Still, it seems uncanny that so many things get broken on a Monday afternoon (when she comes and usually no one else is around). These are small breakages, but sometimes they are something that leads to a costly repair, e.g. if you break a small piece of a mirror, the whole mirror is kind of spoilt, or if you damage a radiator valve, it doesn't just mean I have to pay for the cost of a replacement. I have to pay a lot more for a heating engineer to come out and fix it.

The first time it happened, she told me straight away. Those were some very beautiful vintage cocktail glasses I bought in Lisbon. I think she must have seen on my face how upset I was about it (I doubt I will ever be able to find/afford those same type of glasses again), so since then, she just denies breaking anything, but sometimes it is so obvious that she did it.

Maybe I am being too nice, but I don't want her to get fired or anything. 

What would you do in this situation?

[Mark116]

@Huma0  You're too emotionally invested in not hurting this woman's feelings.  You are paying her to do a job, which is clean without breaking things, and she isn't able to fulfill this duty.  She also lies, which while I can understand that she's under pressure and so on, is still a very bad look.

I think you should ask the couple if either one of them can start cleaning for you again or if there is another person at the company who could replace the woman.  I would tell them what you told us:  she's extremely nice, fast and does a good  job cleaning but too many items are getting damaged, always on the days she comes to clean and she does not bring these damages to your attention.  You can be as diplomatic as possible, but having a cleaner who breaks something 30% of the time is not something that you should tolerate.

I totally get it on the portugese glasses.  I am a life long lover of flea  markets and 'deals' and that is a two edged sword.  You can find all kinds of wonderful items at a fraction of their original/new cost [high], but once they are damaged, the chances are, you will never find them again or for a bargain [low].

[Huma0]

@Mark116 

I know that you are right. Of course, you are right. I need to distance myself emotionally. The couple who run the business seem like very decent people, so I am sure they would handle it in a fair way.

Those glasses were such a find. That particular flea market has lovey things and I really enjoy browsing it when I am there for work, but it's not at all cheap as it's in a super fancy area where there are also a lot of tourists, so I very rarely buy anything there... I was astonished, therefore, to find those glasses for such an incredible price. Here you would pay more for one than I did for the whole set.

I had to put them in my hold luggage and was so worried about them so I packaged them so thoroughly and carefully and they all arrived here in one piece! I know I shouldn't get so attached to 'things', which is what I kept telling myself when some of them were broken, but I REALLY LOVED those glasses, which is why they were out on display rather than stashed away.

[Mark116]

@Huma0  The alternative to asking the couple to replace her is to have an honest talk with her, tell her all the things she does that are great, but that items getting damaged seems to happen on her cleaning day and that if she needs to go slower, that is fine, etc. etc. but that if things continue on with damages you won't be able to continue using her services...something like that.  But, people often react in wildly unpredictable ways when they are directly criticized, especially since she has refused to admit to breaking anything...so this could turn out to be more challenge than is worth it.

[Huma0]

@Mark116 

She barely speaks any English, which is why, initially, I was messaging her boss and asking her to ask the cleaner if she knew what happened to X or Y. 

The most recent thing was the radiator valve, and I did question her directly about it but, at first, she didn't know what I was talking about. When I pressed, she just gave me a really random explanation, which made no sense at all. 

For sure, if her English was better, I would have a frank discussion with her about it as I would always prefer to give people a chance rather than 'rat' on them.