Cleaning Business Life
Cleaning Business Life is the podcast for cleaning business owners who want to build a profitable company without sacrificing their entire life to do it.
Hosted by industry leaders Shannon Miller and Jamie Runco, the show brings real-world conversations about pricing, hiring, leadership, systems, boundaries, profitability, and sustainable growth.
With more than 240 episodes rooted in actual cleaning-industry experience, you’ll hear the lessons, mistakes, hard decisions, and strategies that business owners rarely talk about publicly.
Whether you’re starting your cleaning company, stuck inside the daily operations, or ready to grow into the CEO role, you’ll find honest guidance to help you charge more, earn more, and stress less.
No hype. No surface-level advice. Just real cleaning-business conversations from women who have built the businesses themselves.
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Cleaning Business Life
CBL Episode #89 Avoiding Costly False Alarms: Essential Security Strategies for Your Cleaning Business with Jamie
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Have you ever faced the stress of a false alarm or the financial hit from emergency response fees? Discover essential practices to safeguard your cleaning business from these costly pitfalls. Jamie and I dive deep into alarm compliance, sharing personal stories and practical advice. From hefty fines to anxiety-prone employees, we spotlight the critical need for rigorous alarm protocols. Jamie’s experiences bring to light the dramatic impacts of alarm mishandling and the stringent measures her company employs to avoid such incidents.
Learn from our nerve-wracking encounter with law enforcement due to an alarm system glitch, and understand the importance of meticulous security protocols. We cover everything from the intricacies of advanced security technology to the vital management of keys and ensuring homes are restored to their proper state post-cleaning. With insights on state laws, locked key boxes, and accountability measures, this episode is your guide to maintaining a secure and efficient cleaning operation. Join us for an invaluable discussion packed with lessons to keep your business safe and sound.
Thanks for tuning in to Cleaning Business Life — the podcast for cleaning business owners who want to build a profitable, sustainable company without burning out.
Hosted by Shannon Miller and Jamie Runco, each episode pulls back the curtain on what it really takes to start, grow, and scale a cleaning business — covering pricing, systems, leadership, boundaries, and the real conversations most people avoid.
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— Shannon & Jamie
Alarm Compliance in Cleaning Business
Speaker 1Good morning , jamie . How are you Doing awesome ? We're doing great . Yeah , we're here . We're almost hitting the end of the year and there's just a couple more episodes that we need to film and edit and then we will be done . Yay , yes . For those of you who do not know , my name is Shannon Miller . I'm actually the host of Cleaning Business Life and I'm joined with Miss Jamie , my co host of Cleaning Business Life . She has a cleaning company in Northern California called Above All Cleaning Company . I said it right .
Speaker 1So welcome , welcome and today , I believe we are talking about alarms , what to do if you trigger alarm , why you need to set the alarm , what can happen if you forget to set the alarm , how there's fees and fines from fire departments for not doing the right thing and it's a very serious checkmark , a list if you do it incorrectly and if you have enough episodes , the fire department will fine you and they'll gain you .
Speaker 2Yeah , Never mind , we just got a letter in the mail in regards to alarms going off From here on out . Yeah , from here on out . I should have grabbed it before we came on . But this is me so . Yeah , but this is me so . Um , yeah , anytime that it goes off and it's a false alarm , you're getting dinged in the city of rio del . I don't know if that's you know . We're in california , so everything's by city , county , the , the whole state is not as one . Like , just what happens here don't necessarily happen down in LA .
Speaker 1So there is . There's a reason for the fine and it's because the resource that well , we've all heard . If you've paid any attention to what's gone down the last I don't know seven or eight years , there's been a lot of defunding of a lot of projects . I've always been a firm believer that . You know , police firemen are essential . We need those to keep the order of things because people need it .
Speaker 1We need ambulances . There's just certain services that we need in our society and that make things run smoothly . And because of that I've noticed there is a push by a lot of these city entities to hold people accountable and when you have too many dings like , because they like literally firemen are on duty and I believe what is it ? It's been a while since I've spoken to a fire person I have to say person now and I think they work like four 12s or and then they're off three days and then they work four more 12s and they're off three days . If you are a fire person and you know what the regimen is , please reach out .
Speaker 1I'd love to hear and I don't want to miscorrectly say , but the reason for that is because if their alarm goes off and it's a fire , an alarm and it doesn't say burglary and it's a fire , an alarm and it doesn't say burglary , it triggers over to the next entity and that is fire . The firemen come and they get ready and it costs money I don't know how much money . They broke it down one time in the city of Long Beach , where I used to reside in California , and it was something like some ridiculous amount of money at the time the 90s , I think it was like 388 bucks per . Oh . Where is what they charge to just get up out of the door and leave ? There's an initial fee and then they charge you by the mile .
Speaker 2It's crazy we're definitely talking about the 90s , because I think we're in the thousands now , more of like I'm thinking $2,000 , $3,000 .
Speaker 1I think right out the gate is what that is .
Speaker 1And they add on per mile on how much , because to run a legitimate business you hear me preach it all the time it costs money . So when you're costing other entities money , they can't just keep going oh sorry , we're going to eat it , oh sorry , we're going to eat . Those days are gone . They going oh sorry , we're going to eat it , oh sorry , we're going to eat . Those days are gone . They're starting to hold people accountable and I don't know if you've ever have you ever been on site when the alarm's gone off , or the silent alarm , and the police show up with their guns out ?
Speaker 2Not with the guns out , but and I will say , the reason why the guns weren't drawn is because I have my car , right , I mean , everybody knows it's me . And , um , whenever that goes off , and when the alarm goes off and you can't get the code , because you start shaking and you're like , oh my gosh , and if you don't put it in , you know it's just like hey , it's me , the alarm's going off . And yeah , I've had cops come and say , hey , is that you , jamie , right ? Yep , I'm sorry , I set the alarm . I've set the alarm off at my church . I've set the alarm off at the banks , and so has my employees . They've also forgot to set the alarm . That's that in my industry , is a huge no-no . I've lost a client , one client . It took me one time . Never again . I put it in my paperwork that that is a huge no-no , right , we don't .
Speaker 1Because it's so important . Yes , it is very important , and setting and disarming an alarm is not for everybody . It's not for the faint of heart and if you have a person who has a lot of anxiety , they might not be the best person to send over there because they have to . They'll trigger the alarm unintentionally and it will happen because they're self-sabotaging , because they can't get past from point A to point B . I've watched it happen . So ask your employee who you're sending over there . Are you comfortable disarming an alarm and resetting the alarm ?
Speaker 2alarm and resetting the alarm , like when I go ahead , I have I have it in our notes that because it'll start going , boo boo , boo , boo , take a big deep breath , blow it out and slowly , just because that sometimes that first number that you hit it don't make that boop , just put it in and then pound , but you gotta take a deep breath and step back and calm yourself down . It won't send a ding yet , even though it sounds like it whenever the alarm goes off .
Speaker 2It does go off , but it don't send a dean to anybody yet it doesn't know , because they don't know if it's a false alarm or not , because this happens a lot , you know right but , yeah , come in .
Speaker 1you've not put in in the right alarm key . And then usually , um , what the protocol is this may have changed over the years is they will call the property to say is everything , and they'll give you a code word to use or a certain number to use , like this is a 2222 and which is an alarm , or this is a active robbery in place . Please come , you want people , you want them to come on those types of situations .
Speaker 2So on the alarm it'll even ask you is this a false alarm , right ? And then , and then it goes to the next thing , the next step of somebody calling and either a code , word or number and then you can just put it . Put it in . The technician usually will walk you through it if this does happen . But we don't want this to happen , right ? No , we don't want this to happen . It's a very scary situation , especially the first time you feel like you have done , lost everything and you get shaky and it just makes for a miserable time they can throw people off too , if they can't recover from the initial episode , and then they have a bad time .
Speaker 1So , um , people off too , if they can't recover from the initial episode , and then then they have a bad clean , and then it becomes this whole like piles upon each other .
Speaker 2Yeah , you missed this . You missed this . How come the the paper towels weren't um ?
Speaker 1yeah , they were all freaked out .
Security Protocols for Cleaning Techs
Speaker 1We actually um way back in the day , when I was cleaning , we had a commercial property and I believe her name was Susan . Susan went ahead of me . She had worked with me several times on this property . Susan walked in , put in the keypad , nothing happened . I get inside , I lock the door because you should always lock the door for safety after you get inside a building , because you just never know . And she said you know , the alarm acted really weird and blah , blah , blah , and we had just had monsoons roll through and like oh , it was probably just the lightning , blah , blah , blah .
Speaker 1I didn't think anything of it . It triggered the silent alarm and like nine Prescott police officers showed up with guns blazing and I wasn't wearing a uniform . Susan was wearing um half of her uniform . So we had I didn't have a driver's license to prove I was in a company vehicle , but it could have been stolen as far as they were concerned . Yeah , well , they put up , put us up against the wall . I had to drop my feather duster and susan's starting to shake . I think she's gonna end up vomiting over the whole experience because the adrenaline's running . Yeah , patting us down , asking us questions there was no polite like hey , I know you are , we were , and what had happened is they ? They determined that there was a glitch in the alarm and I didn't get dinged is that particular building had been robbed and no one had said anything to us . So they were hypervigilant about catching the thieves the second time . And I'm like no kidding .
Speaker 2It was a feather duster . I'm like hands up , hands up .
Speaker 1I dropped my feather duster . Drop it , drop it .
Speaker 2I'm like okay , Well , and the same goes for especially nowadays , with the way technology , I mean , it just is overwhelming with the amount of awesome technology that we have for even residential . This isn't just for commercial cleaning , this is also for residential . And we have a lot of people have those keypads that can unlock and unlock with your thumbprint , and so we have a lot of those as well , and we always have to make sure that we follow protocol to secure their home . I mean , and if you don't especially after the amounts of times that I have said until I'm blue in my face , that I have said until I'm blue in my face , your notes are in my CRM for you know to keep that this is so important , and if this happens , it's a write-up . And if it happens again , I got to let you know Because I mean you should one time write-up , you should know by then to never do that again , and I'll make you learn your lesson .
Speaker 1It , definitely it was . The lesson for us is , after I got frisked , I was like this is never happening again . Yeah , yeah , the pat down . The pat down was the the line in the sand for Shannon . So you know , and I'm , like you know , trying to like look for my father . I was like I hope he doesn't step on my father , right ? You know , as cleaners , we're only thinking of ourselves , right .
Speaker 2It's like a pretty poor feather . I don't want him to step on it . Is it raining now ?
Speaker 1I don't want him to get wet Right and you know it's patting down and you know it was a fun situation and I can laugh about it now . But it is a very serious layer that you're adding on to the responsibility of buildings . Buildings can be worth millions of dollars , homes can be worth millions of dollars and there are keypads and thumbprints and scans and all of the crazy stuff . It depends on if you have a smart house or not . I don't like the smart houses because there's always the air conditioning , right . Well , it's only set to 77 degrees , you're like , but I want it to be 72 . No , I'm like override , override , override , override , right . So it's like cold , weird .
Speaker 2It's so funny . Yeah , it's funny . Like you said , we can laugh at it now . But I've had some serious situations to where some of my cleaning techs I've actually lost a client over the home not being secured . She had went in and cleaned in and it's just not alarms . Neither I guess they do have alarms on windows . But she went and cleaned in the bathroom and was so hot in there she said she had to open up the window and forgot to close the window and that was just . Yeah , that was the end of the road for this client . There was no really recovering . I mean , what am I going to say ? You know I , you know if you'd like to give us another try , or you know I , just it wasn't going to work .
Speaker 1Thankfully we haven't had that happen too often . We usually get the hey , you left your electrical fireplace on , do you want us to turn it off ? And they're like and they've left the country You're like . You know they text them like . They're like oh yeah , can you turn that off ? Or you know you've left the front door open . The front door is open , you know , because a lot of people have second homes up here , so and then they live down in Scottsdale or we're down in Tucson or whatever , and then they're usually the cleaning tech will say hey , the front door was open .
Speaker 1I'm like did you call the police before you went in ? Yeah , you could be walking into anything , but what ? The one particular house , the way they face the house . It's a beautiful home . The wind hits it because they're up on a hill and it has to be locked all the time or the wind will push it open and it's one of those really heavy , big doors . It's like 15 feet high . I think the doors are beautiful , but they're hard to open and close and you have to lock it . So you and they have pets , so you don't want their pets escaping , right . So there's this weird you have have to know . You just have to know these types of things . So , um , there are alarms , there's key fobs don't lose someone's key fob . It's really expensive . They could be like 400 bucks or more it's so hard having keys too .
Speaker 2I hate being responsible for keys . Normally I , I , I try , my , I don't . It's only a few clients that we have keys for . Commercial is a totally different story , that's a given . But for residential , I like for them to have their own lockbox , and there's just some that are just elderly and they just can't get it to go around their door . It's too close to the , the door jam , or you know , and it's just so I'll hold on to them . But we have a place at our , in our building , that holds keys , and you know we label them . And yeah , make sure that everything it's not just the alarms , because there's alarms on the windows , there's alarms just the sliding glass doors , you know . So make sure that everything is closed , tidied up . So make sure that everything is closed , tidied up , all the outlets are turned off , all the electricity is done . Go back and recheck everything .
Speaker 1right , it's always a good practice to walk through at the end , especially in the summer , and they're not home and you're turning on the air conditioning . Remember to turn off the air conditioning . I honestly haven't had that happen with us in a long time . Knock on wood . But they'll know that there's an extra increase in electricity if you leave on the electricity or walk in and it's freezing in there or hot , and it happens we have it in the wintertime .
Speaker 1You know people don't realize that it freezes up here . We do get a couple of snowfalls every year nothing like Tahoe or anything but that you can't and most of them are from Southern California . They don't realize that it freezes here and their pipes will freeze and it'll flood . So I'm like you have to keep your heat on at a minimum of , like you know , 55 degrees , that's the minimum .
Speaker 1That way you're not coming in and you're not frozen and then we're having to ding you for a show up fee . But those are elements too . As far as the you had mentioned the lockbox on , you can actually attach lockboxes to a fence that's close by , or you know how they have those stakes that you can buy that whole decorative flower pots , I don't know , oh , yeah , with the little hook , yeah , or or the , or even those little decorative uh flags that they have , right , so we'll put it right over there . So it's camouflaged and you can't really see it , and usually behind a flower pot , so no one knows there's a lock box there .
Speaker 1Um , is usually what we do . I've only had it one time . Where we went and the lockbox was gone is because it fell off of the actual hook thing that it was on and the landscaper just tossed it in the trash . I'm like , what are you doing ? Where is the key ? And then you know , oh , we threw it away . We thought it was like no says property of you know yes , yes , yes , make sure that you label that too .
Speaker 2If you do hold on to keys , make sure that you put property of . For me it's , above all , cleaning services . For you it's castle keeper cleaning . So make sure that you're labeling your keys and try and stay steer clear as much as you possibly can from holding all those keys . I understand that Airbnb flips are a little different . Sometimes you know you don't have the client there in the same state , so you do have to have the keys and you know , I know angie does a lot of of um airbnb .
Speaker 1Yeah , short-term rentals , that's what I mean yeah , the protocol and you're probably figuring out . You're hearing jamie and I talk about this key thing and these lock boxes and real estate boxes and contractor boxes , whatever they're labeled as the the protocol for an easy fix . Cause you're like well , why do I want to pay for this ? You can do it one of two ways . So the first way is to try to get the client to pay for it . So when you sign them up , is that first like hey , by the way , there's going to be this initial cost . I'm going to have this drop ship to your house . You don't have to do anything but supply us a second set of keys . We require that you're present when we show up this time . Or they give them to you firsthand and then the cleaner puts them in the drop box , or the homeowner sets the code and puts the keys in the drop box . All three of those scenarios will work .
Speaker 1But you're like well , I don't want to pay $50 for a drop box , right ? So you drop ship it and then you just add it on to the client's bill . And then for a Dropbox , right ? So you drop ship it and then you just add it onto the client's bill and then it becomes the property of the client , and then you don't have to label it and then there's no extra management required , except for when they decide to have their house rekeyed . I always recommend that they only rekey the front door and that the rest of the house has private key settings . So that way , if your cleaning tech loses the key , you're not having to pay to rekey the whole house , you're only having to pay to rekey the one door .
Speaker 1So that's just a way to work around all of that dynamic of the key , the key box , and then you can put the key box . Typically , most homeowners do not want the key box sitting . Then you can put the key box . Um , typically most homeowners do not want the key box sitting on , unless it's a short-term rental or some other weird situation . Um , you can . You can hang it off a fence . You can hang it in an area , um , that does not have full sun and is not in the way of sprinklers , because those will both cause the lock box to fail .
Speaker 2Oh , and you know , wasn't your father , wasn't your dad a locksmith ?
Speaker 1My dad was a locksmith . We um , when I lived in Los Angeles as a kid I grew up in Redondo beach and um , he was a locksmith and we rekeyed several buildings in the downtown Los Angeles areas and I worked for my dad for many years and and the reason why he liked me is because I had small fingers and I was nimble , so I was able to work and put the cores in . There's these little pebbles that fit in the core to fit the keys and there's this machine you have to squish it together . I'm sure that process has changed over the years , but this is just what I remember . I was like 13 .
Speaker 2Yeah , no , that's great , that's yeah , and you would know so .
Speaker 1And I didn't know . This about buildings is , when you are on a building , even though they look perpendicular straight up and down , when you're at the top of the building and you're looking down from the roof , the building actually bows a little . It's not straight up and down , it's not like at a firm straight line . It does curve a little and , um , that's done intentionally for wind flow is what I was told . If you have learned something other than what my little brain remembers , yeah , it was interesting to be on the top of these buildings . I had like 20 or 30 floors , or sometimes 40 or 50 floors , and you would look at the top and you're like that's a long ways down but the building would bow just a little .
Speaker 2Um , and that's kind that's uh like whenever I went to new york city and we're looking up at all the skyscrapers and everything is just uh , moving and swaying and it's like , wow , it's pretty impressive yeah they're on rollers so that they can move when the earth shifts , which is like if you think about the engineering feat of something like that yeah , they have their own rollers so that they can move when the earth shifts , which is like , if you think about the engineering feat of something like that , it's just it's phenomenal , and
Speaker 1that was most of the time blowing , isn't it ? It's amazing , right ? So just some things to consider . If you're going to do keys ,
Cleaning Business Alarm and Key Policies
Speaker 1keys should also , if you're going to take on , make sure that it's legal in your state to house someone's keys for their properties . I believe Kim mentioned on more than one occasion in Colorado you cannot store homeowners keys . It's against the years since I visited there . But if you're going to store keys they need to be in a locked like . We used to keep ours in a locked key box and they were labeled so that if someone lost one of those keys , no one would know that it was you know . 1234 . Main says you know and you numbered the keys , one through whatever 200 and 200 to sign out or 100 employees find out .
Speaker 1Yeah , so that way you can check um , and then if they lost a key , then they got and make sure that you are having your cleaning tech sign a key policy and he says that if they lose the keys they are ultimately responsible for paying for the locksmith fee , whatever that is .
Speaker 2Oh OK , Mine's equipment policy it's still part of the policy Still still part of the equipment .
Speaker 1And make sure that's legal in your state to do so . Some states you can't , you just have to . It's a cost of doing business and you just eat that cost . But I can tell you any time my business ate the cost of doing business and you just eat that cost . But I can tell you anytime my business ate the cost of doing business .
Speaker 1You were let go yes sorry yeah , whenever it's uh , oops , um yeah you gotta go when you go into homes and if you are opening up windows and doors because it's hot or whatever , make sure you're closing them . And the same deal with heating and air conditioning . If you're turning on the air conditioning someone's home , make sure that you're turning it off or you're setting it back to where it was initially . If you're not a person who can remember what that was , snap a photo and then , when you're getting ready to leave , go . Oh , this was set at 74 degrees . Okay , 74 degrees , right 74 degrees it is .
Speaker 2That's a good , that's a great idea . Snap a photo Right .
Speaker 1And then that way you remember , then you're not having to think about anything extra and you can focus on setting the alarm and getting out of the building .
Speaker 2Right , right , but do do that final walkthrough and make sure . I know that whenever we're done sometimes you're just done , but you've got to do that one last extra step , just to make sure . Did I lock this house up ? Did I open up that window ? Did I , you know ? Did I forget anything ? Did I forget a bottle ? Did I forget a rag ? Did a rag drop out of my bag ? Just make sure you do that final walkthrough to make sure this home is secured or building , or whatever you're cleaning at that time , because this is , this is such a nightmare for the owner . Um , we have to do a lot of of caressing the booty a little and trying to smooth things over , like it's trying to explain to a homeowner that this will never happen again . The , the relationship is now soured , right , so , and if that happens , I'm sorry , you're getting a write up .
Speaker 1Right and people have a different perception of what that fear is . For example , I've lived in Northern Arizona and I always say 20 and back right . I've lived here 20 years . We just legitimately started locking our doors because we're rural , but we've had so many people move in here from other areas that we actually have to lock our vehicles . We never I mean it's always for years . My cousin has been here 30 years . My husband's been here 30 years . We've never locked vehicles or cars . But we're having to do that now because things have changed . So it's just , you know , a polite courtesy . It can push people up over the edge enough to go bye . See you later . I can't . This is too much for me . You are irresponsible and subsequently the cost of that is going to be high , and we all know how much it costs to acquire one client . It's a lot of money , even if , depending on how you layer your marketing , it can be like sometimes 227 bucks just to get them in the door .
Speaker 1And then you have to other things that have to happen , and so not only did you lose a client , you just ate 227 bucks , right .
Speaker 2So and possibly six , seven $8,000 for your bottom line .
Speaker 1Right . So there's that picture too . So when that happens , make sure that you're holding your cleaning tax accountable . As far as let's touch on the topic of 1099s , yes , you have independent car tractors . You're also making them sign a key policy and that does everything to protect you . Sometimes the 1099 doesn't work out . You want to have a key policy that they have 24 hours to return said key or you're going to bill them , and that comes from not paying your 1099s right away that you're accruing a little bit before payment because they haven't sent you the request for payment in , and that covers you . But if you don't have a key policy and you're delegating out these keys , you need to have a way to get the key back , because again , that fear comes in with the homeowner , not because we've done anything wrong , but because we're portrayed as less than sometimes Not all the time now I can honestly .
Speaker 2Oh , you froze up so you feel good ?
Speaker 1Yeah , did I freeze up . Yeah , okay .
Speaker 2Perfect .
Speaker 1We're good , so that's . That's what's going on there . Okay , Perfect . So if you don't have a policy in place with your 1099s and they decide to not give you back the key , you as the business owner have to take responsibility of that and pay to have that building rekeyed or the locksmith fee or whatever is going to happen . Right , Most of the time it's not a key change that happens , it's the alarm code that changes . So that way it kind of supersedes the key changing and the locksmith fee being all that other stuff .
Speaker 2I hope that kind of makes sense yeah , no , it makes all the sense in the world . And uh , was we going to talk about 1099s and the non-competes too ?
Speaker 1or um no , we can talk about non-competes in another episode , because I think we could actually honestly talk about that for a good 90 minutes . There's a lot that we're seeing in the groups that need to be addressed in the non-competes , and I think we'll just have a whole separate episode with that .
Speaker 2I think so because this needs to be educational , and we're just seeing a lot of misguided information out there that I don't think people are aware of , and again , we'll talk about that on another episode .
Speaker 1But um , back to alarms back to alarms and that's pretty much the basic overall and overall view of alarms and what you should do and not do . Um , obviously you're not going to have the feather duster incident like I did , hopefully , hopefully should do and not do um , obviously you're not going to have the feather duster incident like I did , hopefully , hopefully , being frisked down by like it's a prescott .
Speaker 1Police officers are always so big , they're like six foot five and they're like big guys . I'm just like this little teeny lady , right how you're gonna find in .
Speaker 2There is my scrapers , right . I don't have a good poker face either , so I'm like do you have any weapons ? Well , I do have a razor blade .
Speaker 1Cleaning humor for you guys out there . Well , thank you for tuning in and we look forward to your questions and we'll see you guys soon . Take care Bye .
