Cleaning Company - by Northfields Clean - August 6, 2026

I run Northfields Clean, a cleaning company based in west London, and every single week I’m doing the same thing: interviewing cleaners, checking their backgrounds, and working out whether they’re actually going to do a good job in someone’s home. So when people ask me “where should I even start looking for a cleaner in Ealing,” I’ve got a pretty strong opinion — not just about where to ask, but about what to do once you’ve got a name.

Here’s what I’ve learned from being on the vetting side of this for years.

The Places That Actually Work

The usual suspects are still the usual suspects for a reason. Local Facebook groups for Ealing are a solid place to start — people post honestly there, and you’ll usually get a few genuine replies from neighbours who’ve actually used someone. Nextdoor has been getting more popular too, and it works in a similar way.

Google reviews are worth checking as well, especially for companies rather than individuals — more on how to actually read those reviews properly further down, because it’s not as simple as “more stars, better cleaner.”

And if you’re on a local WhatsApp group for your street or building, ask there. Personal recommendations from people who live near you and have had someone in their actual home carry a lot of weight.

Match the Forum to Your Situation, Not Just the Area

One thing I’d add that people don’t always think about: Ealing isn’t one single audience. It’s a genuinely diverse borough with very different types of households — students, young professionals, busy families, older residents. “Ealing recommendations” as a search doesn’t really account for that.

If you’re a student, a student-focused forum or group is going to give you people who understand your budget and your kind of flat. If you’re a family in a three-bedroom house, you’re better off in a parents’ or family group, because the standards and expectations of a family clean are just different. There’s enough supply out there that you can afford to be specific about who you’re asking.

The Red Flags Most People Wouldn’t Think to Look For

This is where I think I can actually add something useful, because these aren’t the obvious red flags — they’re the subtle ones I look out for when I’m vetting cleaners myself.

They ask you what products to bring

If a cleaner asks you what cleaning products they should use or bring with them, that’s a clear sign of inexperience. A properly experienced cleaner knows their kit and knows what works. This is one of the quickest tells for me.

They balk at a DBS check

Asking for a DBS check is becoming an industry norm, and a good cleaner should expect it and be comfortable with it. If someone pushes back on it or seems uneasy, that’s not a good sign. Either they don’t understand why it matters, which is a red flag in itself, or there’s a reason they’d rather you didn’t check. Neither is good.

Poor timekeeping

This sounds small, but I’d be cautious of a cleaner who isn’t reliable with time. If they’re vague or inconsistent about when they’ll turn up before you’ve even hired them, that tends to carry through into the job itself.

A Story That Sticks With Me

The worst feedback I’ve ever heard came from someone who’d gone looking for the cheapest option they could find, without doing any real diligence on who they were letting into their home — no proper recommendation, no background check, nothing. Unfortunately, they ended up being robbed of cash that was in the house.

I want to be clear — this is an edge case. It’s not the norm, and you won’t hear about it often. But it’s the worst-case scenario, and it’s exactly why the diligence matters even when everything about a situation feels casual and low-stakes. You don’t want to be the one story where it goes wrong.

Independent Cleaner or a Registered Company — What’s the Actual Trade-Off

People often assume going with an individual cleaner someone recommended is basically the same as going with a company, just cheaper. It isn’t, and I think it’s worth being honest about the trade-off rather than just telling you to use a company because that’s what I do.

With a registered company, there’s an actual business behind the service that you can go back to if something goes wrong. Most reputable cleaning companies carry insurance, and their cleaners are covered too — so you’ve effectively got a two-way safety net. The background checks, the DBS checks, all of that vetting work is done for you before a cleaner ever sets foot in your home. Cleaning companies tend to be genuinely risk-averse, because their reputation depends on it.

The honest drawback is price. You’ll usually pay a slight premium compared to an independent cleaner found through a Facebook post. It’s not astronomical, but it’s there, and it covers those business costs — the insurance, the vetting, the accountability.

That’s exactly the gap we try to close at Northfields Clean. We do the vetting, the DBS checks, and the insurance side so our clients don’t have to take that on themselves — you get the safety net of a proper company without having to build one yourself.

Questions to Ask Before You Actually Hire

Once you’ve got a recommendation — whether from a Facebook group, Nextdoor, or a neighbour — don’t stop there. Run through this before you commit:

Check their reviews, whether that’s a company or an individual cleaner
Ask about insurance, so you’re covered if there’s ever an accident or something goes wrong
Ask what their guarantee looks like. At Northfields Clean, for example, we guarantee we’ll come back within seven days if anything’s been missed, so the clean actually meets the standard you were expecting
Ask exactly what’s included in the clean. We give our clients a clear guide upfront so there’s no ambiguity about what they’re paying for, and I’d expect the same from anyone you’re considering

Reviews vs a Recommendation From Someone You Know

I get asked this a lot, so here’s my honest take. With Google reviews, you obviously want to see plenty of five-star ratings — but here’s the bit most people miss: if a cleaning company has over a hundred reviews and not a single one below five stars, that’s actually a bit of a red flag to me. Nobody has a perfect run every single time. One or two lower reviews are completely normal and expected.

What actually matters is how the company responds to that one poor review. Their response tells you far more than the review itself — it shows you how they handle things when something doesn’t go to plan, which is exactly what you want to know before you hand over your house keys.

That said, a personal recommendation from a neighbour still carries the most weight, in my opinion. That’s someone you can talk to face to face, whose home you can see the results in. Online reviews are a good sense check, but where possible, look for more than one source before you decide.

My Advice, In Short

Ask in the right place for your situation, don’t just chase the cheapest option, and always look past the star rating to how a cleaner or company actually behaves when something goes wrong. If you’d rather skip the vetting process altogether, that’s genuinely what we built Northfields Clean to do — we’ve already done the background checks, the insurance, and the guarantees, so you don’t have to piece it together yourself.