Mikey P
Administrator
http://www.yelp.com/biz/genesis-carpet- ... anta-clara
I'm on the fence with these guys. Here's the skinny:
Two guys showed up, on time.
PAUSE. Now, I'm a black woman. Sometimes when I employ white men in their 30s, if it is clear I am not somebody's wife or perhaps because I'm not a size 2 and clearly a ninny, they give me a little bit of attitude. I think they instinctually want to put me in my place because their genes remember what happened 150 years ago 2500 miles east, but we're in California where prejudice comes out in weird ways, since here in northern California no one's going to ever admit out loud they're chafing at something. This has happened to be multiple times when I hire people and they show up at the door - they aren't expecting me, so when they get me, sometimes the 30-35 year olds get a bit cocky, sullen, or stubborn. Men over 40 are generally respectful, probably because they were raised in a generation that taught someone both customer service, manners in someone else's home, and how to respect a woman.
ANYHOO. Two dudes come to the door. One's a 30-something blonde haired, blue-eyed (I think) white dude. The other is a hefty tall brown dude, could be Mexican, could be Samoan, could be Filipino, I don't know, but we're both brown.
I greet them both cheerfully, wave, say hi, greet them, let them in. Immediately, brown dude is cheerful, polite. He's also clearly the leader. He is friendly, professional, warm, a total utter pleasure to work with.
The other dude? He made me think "smart-ass" - and when I wasn't in the room he was yukking it up with brown dude, making snarky comments (just general coworker conversation) and when I was in the room, he was just NOT professional in the same warm way as the other dude was. He was very prickly. I didn't like it.
An example - I forgot to tell them I had a cat. Now, my cat is not smart enough to escape, so she'll run PAST the front door when it's open. I start trying to tell the guys that and blonde dude spends his time cutting me off, giving me attitude-face, etc., because apparently he's miffed I didn't tell them about the cat. Was the cat a problem in the first hour of work? No. Who's house is this? Mine. Be respectful and let me explain the situation, which was really just a "oh by the way, heads up" and nothing to get your panties in a wad about.
Now, the attitude I'd have let roll, and given this 4 stars, except two things:
1) They really tout the rotary cleaning. Well, I dunno if the machine was wacky or if this is just not part of the service and maybe I had to pay extra, but the buffer smushes your carpet. And floods it with water. And leaves it SOAKING WET. Like, does not dry within 12 hours on a hot day wet, but, needs all the windows open on a hot day with fans blowing for 48 hours wet.
So next time, I'm going to hire the people with the vacuum thing that sucks out all the water because I was living in fear I was going to have carpet rot or mold because of the amount of water they left in the carpet.
2) They wore their sneakers - dirty, of course - through the house while doing what they were doing. What happens when you wear dirty sneakers on a wet, freshly cleaned carpet? Uh, you leave dirt. What happens when you step on linoelum? Uh, you leave dirt smudges. Guess what I found when they left and stuff started to dry?
The carpet wasn't too major but I just thought - come on. Common sense. Put footies on or stick some special rubber sole on your shoes so you don't mix dirty shoes with wet carpet and cause drama.
3) Ok this is an add on. Total pet peeve. The brown guy was totally nice about it and I really liked him, BUT - he used my bathroom. The irony being I'd had cleaners come over and JUST cleaned everything, including the bathroom, and he's like, can I use your toilet? And I'm like, OK, but please take off your shoes.
But you know, worker etiquette, is generally you take care of that before you come to the client's house. They were at my place for like 3 hours. I've had plenty of other cleaners and service men come over and never had them need to use the toilet. I'm just saying. Totally bitchy but, gotta be honest, not my fav thing when someone does that.
Not gonna use these guys again. It got the job done but crushed clean soggy carpet is not ideal when I can have fluffy nearly dry clean carpet.
I'm on the fence with these guys. Here's the skinny:
Two guys showed up, on time.
PAUSE. Now, I'm a black woman. Sometimes when I employ white men in their 30s, if it is clear I am not somebody's wife or perhaps because I'm not a size 2 and clearly a ninny, they give me a little bit of attitude. I think they instinctually want to put me in my place because their genes remember what happened 150 years ago 2500 miles east, but we're in California where prejudice comes out in weird ways, since here in northern California no one's going to ever admit out loud they're chafing at something. This has happened to be multiple times when I hire people and they show up at the door - they aren't expecting me, so when they get me, sometimes the 30-35 year olds get a bit cocky, sullen, or stubborn. Men over 40 are generally respectful, probably because they were raised in a generation that taught someone both customer service, manners in someone else's home, and how to respect a woman.
ANYHOO. Two dudes come to the door. One's a 30-something blonde haired, blue-eyed (I think) white dude. The other is a hefty tall brown dude, could be Mexican, could be Samoan, could be Filipino, I don't know, but we're both brown.
I greet them both cheerfully, wave, say hi, greet them, let them in. Immediately, brown dude is cheerful, polite. He's also clearly the leader. He is friendly, professional, warm, a total utter pleasure to work with.
The other dude? He made me think "smart-ass" - and when I wasn't in the room he was yukking it up with brown dude, making snarky comments (just general coworker conversation) and when I was in the room, he was just NOT professional in the same warm way as the other dude was. He was very prickly. I didn't like it.
An example - I forgot to tell them I had a cat. Now, my cat is not smart enough to escape, so she'll run PAST the front door when it's open. I start trying to tell the guys that and blonde dude spends his time cutting me off, giving me attitude-face, etc., because apparently he's miffed I didn't tell them about the cat. Was the cat a problem in the first hour of work? No. Who's house is this? Mine. Be respectful and let me explain the situation, which was really just a "oh by the way, heads up" and nothing to get your panties in a wad about.
Now, the attitude I'd have let roll, and given this 4 stars, except two things:
1) They really tout the rotary cleaning. Well, I dunno if the machine was wacky or if this is just not part of the service and maybe I had to pay extra, but the buffer smushes your carpet. And floods it with water. And leaves it SOAKING WET. Like, does not dry within 12 hours on a hot day wet, but, needs all the windows open on a hot day with fans blowing for 48 hours wet.
So next time, I'm going to hire the people with the vacuum thing that sucks out all the water because I was living in fear I was going to have carpet rot or mold because of the amount of water they left in the carpet.
2) They wore their sneakers - dirty, of course - through the house while doing what they were doing. What happens when you wear dirty sneakers on a wet, freshly cleaned carpet? Uh, you leave dirt. What happens when you step on linoelum? Uh, you leave dirt smudges. Guess what I found when they left and stuff started to dry?
The carpet wasn't too major but I just thought - come on. Common sense. Put footies on or stick some special rubber sole on your shoes so you don't mix dirty shoes with wet carpet and cause drama.
3) Ok this is an add on. Total pet peeve. The brown guy was totally nice about it and I really liked him, BUT - he used my bathroom. The irony being I'd had cleaners come over and JUST cleaned everything, including the bathroom, and he's like, can I use your toilet? And I'm like, OK, but please take off your shoes.
But you know, worker etiquette, is generally you take care of that before you come to the client's house. They were at my place for like 3 hours. I've had plenty of other cleaners and service men come over and never had them need to use the toilet. I'm just saying. Totally bitchy but, gotta be honest, not my fav thing when someone does that.
Not gonna use these guys again. It got the job done but crushed clean soggy carpet is not ideal when I can have fluffy nearly dry clean carpet.
