Merry Maids
Reviews and Complaints

I live in a small apartment and called this service to clean four rooms.I was told that it would be between 160-260 for the first visit. I told them to forget it at first but then called them back and said that that sounded okay. She said it would probably be less. Four people came to clean and when I returned the bill was 448! It was clean but not sparkling and I really could see nothing but the bill. I called and yelled a bit but got no where. I highly suggest NO ONE USES THIS COMPANY TO CLEAN.

The maids were lazy, and tried to scam us out of more money even though they were too lazy to do their work. When they clean, then don't put stuff back where they found it. Unorganized and cheap service. My son was so angry when he found that his organized room became a wreck after they left, and his paper airplane that won a contest was kept in mint condition, but was under a pile of books when we came back. Everything in the bathroom was out of order. We've tried Molly Maids before, and it was much better than Merry Maids . Don't use this service if you have antiques or if you're an organized family.

The manager at the Iowa City, IA location is horrible. Do not apply or consider wasting your time working for this person.

The manager plays dirty, does not follow the rules, lies like the width of the ocean, and then uses the lies to wrongfully write people up or terminate them.

Corporate in TN will not even call back non-management employees or listen to their complaints when the "Average" employee is being "Abused" by management authority.

Wasn't aware that dictators were allowed to be managers here in the USA.

After $250 dollars, the bed terribly made, the full size mirror in the master bathroom dirty, upholstery not vacuumed (they came back to do it);the kitchen floor, which was supposed to be "the same as the bathrooms" according to what they told me on the phone, was simply mopped on top of the old dirt.

The day the "SALES MANAGER" came to give me an estimate, she took a credit card number and said I did not need to use the same card the same day that services were rendered. I gave them a check, call them to tell them, they said it was ok, the card would not be charged, and I discovered that it had already been charged. They very graciously offered to give me a credit and did not even apologize!

I contracted for 2 hours of cleaning - almost $200.00. I was expecting out of town guests and was counting on them to make the house ready.

They arrived 45 minutes later than the time I was told. We left to do errands and less than an hour later were called to say "they needed more time".

I said no - when we arrived home we found that they had cleaned only the master bedroom, the kitchen (small) and the bathroom (small). They had not touched my living/dining area, the kitchen floor, nor my GUEST bedrooms. So much for getting ready for my guests!

They had failed to clean the bathroom sink fixtures - when I complained they offered to send someone out (I declined - how ridiculous! They should have offered me a refund). I found fast food bags (which they did not have when they arrived) in the garbage which meant they had eaten breakfast (?) on my time.

All in all it was a huge ripoff and I would certainly not recommend them nor let them near my house again!

I would like to recommend that no one get service from the office located on 6101 Idlewild Road #135 in Charlotte, NC
The Franchise office managers there are cruel. They have previously discriminated employees due to their accent even though they are US Citizens, from other countries but clean on a background check. Also they supposedly put office employees on salary but they hardly give them breaks and work long hours. How can customers and business partners trust such unfair people like that? Just remember you two
bosses there, what comes around goes around, you should be ashamed of how you have treated employees there. What a coincidence that now that this SB 1070 law is trying to come out, you are now showing your true colors. Someone shoud report this to a major newspaper or news channel to show how this SB 1070 would start giving these kind of people reason to discriminate more. Shame on you for abusing your employee's! May God have mercy on you, you can't hide what you do from Him, hopefully one day
you will realize and accept your unprofessional rotton attitude and treat all employees with dignity and respect like you would like to be treated if you were in their position. If you are a Merry Maid employee and are going through something I urge you to report it, the reason why these work discriminations keep happening is because people don't want to report it and have it stopped. If you are a good employee and get treated bad, then you have rights to be defended, remember that. These two bosses at this locaton give this company a bad name! Thank-you!

I was charged a $88 lock-out fee by the Merry Maid at 20331 Lake Forest Drive, Suite C14, Lake Forest, CA even though they showed up at my house 3 hours early. I had an 11am-3pm appointment and they showed up at 8am, while I was getting dressed for a morning appointment. I told them to come back at the scheduled time, and they said they would. They never showed up after I waited around all day, and when I called to complain, they claimed I had an 8am appointment, which was a total lie, and they refused to clean my house, and they charged me a lockout fee, even though I was at home. This is a total rip-off. I was going to sign up for a monthly service, but I am appalled for being charged for their mistake.

I recently had to move my father from his own house to an assisted living facility. I had to clean out his rented house and get it cleaned. I called MerryMaids and got a quote of $456.00 to clean "from the top down" as the rep told me. They were supposed to wipe down all the window blinds, clean all the ceiling fan blades, wipe off all the cobwebs, sanitize the kitchen and bathroom. In essence she was telling me what I would get instead of me telling her what I needed. She also told me that I would have to make sure that everything was picked up off the floor for them to vacuum. She also told me that the product they used to clean would tarnish the gold toned fixtures in the bathroom so they would not be able to scrub the bathtub. I needed the cleaning done as soon as possible as I was turning the keys back to the landlord the next day. I had tried to get them to come earlier in the week but they were all booked up. The rep had warned me about the lock-out fee so I gave her a key (since the house was empty I saw no harm) and told her to have the cleaners drop in the locked mail box when they were done. This was a Friday - I expected them to start the work first thing in the morning. We drove past Friday evening about 5:00PM to take a look and make sure everything was ship shape - the cleaners were still there. We drove past again around 8:00PM only to see that they were still there - I did not have a good feeling about this. The next morning my husband went over to the house to finish up some last minute hauling and he called me to say the bathroom was still filthy. I gathered up cleaning supplies and went over to the house and within about 45 minutes I had scrubbed everything down mostly just using hot water and a sponge - also Kaboom bathroom cleaner works pretty well. Note: I suffer with a bad back, hips, and knees so this was extremely painful for me - that's why I hired MerryMaids. My husband in the meantime had checked out the kitchen and found that while they had cleaned the stove top fairly well (the inside would have cost extra), they had not put the burner bibs back. He found them in one of the drawers still wet.

On Monday I called and voice my displeasure and was connected with the customer complaint department. When I told the woman that the bathroom had not even been touched she told me that it was not requested. I told her that I had specifically requested both the kitchen and bathroom sanitization packages. She put me on hold and found the original handwritten estimate and then apologized for missing the item. I don't mean to be ugly but why would anyone leave out the bathroom when the rest of the house is being cleaned - wouldn't a normal person ask questions. She offered to have someone come back that day to clean and I told her it was too late I needed it done last week. I was pleasantly surprised when she offered to refund the amount that was estimated for cleaning the bathroom $62.00 - while I don't think the refund was adequate it did come through. However, I will never use MerryMaids again, nor recommend them to anybody.

I should have know at the initial "assessment" meeting where the woman asked about each task over and over - I saw her recording my answers on a form, but when the cleaners showed up they were not aware of what they were supposed to do. I found them chewing up the clock in their car in my driveway, and the house was not cleaned. I called the office, but the manager was obnoxious and so was his co- worker - I decided to write it off as a bad decision.

I was pleased with the first 3 visits by the Merry Maids, then on the 4th visit half of the house was very visibly not cleaned. I got home less than an hour after the cleaning, and called the office to leave a message that the job wasn't done. I never got a call back, and when I called again twice they refused to come back out an re-clean despite that they say they will do just that to fix a bad cleaning. Then, after I fired them I discovered they charged me again for the next week's cleaning that they never did! It's been a nightmare of bad service. Despite leaving messages on the machine, I haven't gotten calls back at all until I call during business hours. I still don't have my credit posted because they can't find records of having charged me too many times, despite sending them my credit card records. Terrible customer service after they're mistakes. They're doing exactly what they advertise they don't do.

Had Merry Maids come out. Initial cleaning was ok but was overcharged . Second visit, team showed up unexpected no appointment arranged. This time cleaning was horrible, were in my home less than an hour. Also over charged for this visit by 30.00. When i called to complain I was told that I would get a call back. Its been a month no call back no reschedule. Horrible customer service. I would not recommend this company.

We just returned home after the Merry Maids cleaned it. To beginwith our home is not dirty we just wanted the floors, wood cabinets and wood work cleaned. Well there were visable spots on the ceramic floor tiles and hardwood floors. When we took a damp paper towel to the surfaces they all had dirt on them. They did fold the toilet paper rool ends and paper towel roll. Not worth the $275 we are now out of pocket on this one. We will never have them back.

I know first hand that this mm offce is very unproffessional. The manager is very rude to customers and employees. They over charge the elderly and the disabled espeially if the insurance company or the state is paying the bill. One of the employees will rip off customers on a first time in and say she was there 2 hours and really only there for 1 hour this happens when the customer is not home to verify time in home. This all really makes me sick, especially when the seniors and disabled get ripped off. I have cleaned for a long time and would do extras for the elderly and disabled.And to rip off customers, how can you sleep at night. I would not want it done to me.

I'm 39 weeks pregnant and wanted a good cleaning done since I'm not able to do it the way I like. I literally just had Merry Maids leave my house and it took 2 women almost 3 hours to do what normally should take about an hour and 1/2. Over $250 dollars later, I am completely mortified that I used this service and wasted money on Merry Maids. There are so many good services out there and this Merry Maids really gives cleaning services a bad name.

I have been employed with Merry Maids for 6 months. And I can tell you that most of these reviews are probably 100% true. Yes the teams are trained properly. But as soon as training is complete, the focus turns to speed instead of thoroughness. While your being charged for example $100.00 for this service, each team mate is lucky to see 10-15% of that. We work on a commision base, which means the more houses we can get cleaned, the more money we will make. Sub-standard service for too-high prices becomes the normal in this company. And the employees seem to be the last ones they are concerned about. I got hurt on the job and because I went to the doctors, I was penialized for the injury and told that if I hadnt gone to the doctors, I wouldnt have been. Anyone with any sense or morals wouldnt hire this company. Im leaving in a few months myself and taking a good part of my regular customers with me. They enjoy my services.

I live in the Baltimore area now and am a breast cancer survivor... twice in 9 years. I should also note that I cleaned houses as an independent contractor for many years. I can no longer do normal house cleaning due to the residuals of chemotherapy after radical mastectomy and lymph nodes removal. My surgeon's staff select recipients and then they contract Merry Maids for (6) 1-hour cleanings as a service to people in my condition. I was grateful to be on the receiving end of a service that I once did. The "maids" who came were nice enough but they will not lift a hand to move one item (no matter how lightweight) to thoroughly clean a room. They just quickly dust and push a mop around things. Never asked them to move heavy furniture, but they wouldn't even move a tray table to clean under it or shoes at the edge of a bed. I ran a mop on the kitchen floor after they left and it was filthy. I would have been fired from every job I did on the first day if I "cleaned" like Merry Maids. Perhaps, the company provides no training and just hire anybody that can tolerate menial labor. We will go back to small independents for satisfactory cleaning. I just feel badly that donations are raised to provide a service for the physically challenged and these funds are wasted on Merry Maids.

I am from the Springfield, Ma area and I only had them come out to my home twice and both times they had to return the next day to actually complete the job, with still minimal results! The reason I needed the extra help is because I am 9 months pregnant and the idea of getting down on my hands & knees to wash floors and scrub toilets was not appealing to me, or even possible, at this point. I only have a 900 sq. ft. condo and they charged me $136 for the first cleaning and $76 each week thereafter, however they promised all these "extras" that smaller services didn't provide. Needless to say, NONE of the extras were ever done, let alone normal cleaning each time. My master bath was skipped on both occasions! Only good thing to come out of it was that my money for the second cleaning is being promised to be returned to me...we'll see if that happens. EVERYTHING that was in my contract was not done. I also was supposed to have a designated cleaner responsible for my home and someone different came each time. Search around a get more estimates, DO NOT hire Merry Maids!

Be careful of Merry Maids in Washington DC and Merry Maids coporate officein Memphis TN. The local branch in Washington DC cleaned one of my houses for about 4 months. I had to call 3 times and remind them to clean and disinfect the kitchen appliances ( something that was discussed when the francise owner wrote the original estimate). After not showing up for a scheduled appointment one day I called the francise owner. He was rude and very disrespectful. I asked for the Merry Maids corporate phone number and he refused to give it to me. I found the phone number on my own and called. I can't tell how unfriendly and disorganized this company is. After leaving numerous messages for a member of the francise support team and getting no return phone calls I finally got a hold of the president ( it took 2 messages and over a week for her to call me back). I still never got Merry Maids to correct the problem. In these tough economic times you think a company would try to keep a loyal customer. If you are looking for a maid service I would think twice before bringing Merry Maids into your home due to the frustration and they have caused me.

Before I moved into my new home I hired Merry Maids to clean it for me. On Nov 13th, 2008 Merry Maids came to my home with a four-person team to clean my 3bdrm tri-level home. However, the quality of the cleaning was a disappointment. I thought I paid for hand washed floors, cleaning of the ceiling fans, refrigerator, base boards and bathroom floors. Unfortunately, thats not what I got. The floors did not appear to have been hand washed; there were dead flies left in the corners. There was still dust on the ceiling fans. The refrigerator (freezer included) was only wiped down, not cleaned/washed. The base boards and bathroom floors were still dirty. Also, I was assured that I did not need to supply any cleaning supplies but to my astonishment the cleaners had used my Lysol cleanser.

Later that day I called George at 4:30pm to tell him about the floors. He offered to come back the following month. Upon further inspection of the house I called back to report the condition of the everything else I had found. After two more conversations and an inability to settle on a new appointment time I requested a full refund. George then said he'd call back. I missed his return call and when I called him back that day I spoke with his wife. Unfortunately, her customer service skills were lacking. She was condescending and argumentative.

The next day I called back very eager to settle this situation. I offered to accept a refund of $100.00 only; allowing Merry Maid to keep $40.00 for transportation fees and George refused. He counter-offered me only a $75.00 refund by mail. Exasperated at this point, I reluctantly agreed. As of today I still have not received a refund.