Bathrobe fashion show

CONTRIBUTED BY MEREDITH NOVARIO

I recently asked you about who cleaned your house and you gave me tips and I took action and now I’m back to report. Grab a seat.

Last Friday at noon, Nae-san was on our doorstep with all her own cleaning products and tools and magic wands. I pretty much fell in love despite what turned out to be the first hours of a virus that knocked our house down for five days. I hope she didn’t catch it because I desperately want her to come back and charm us again.

It went like this.

I frantically pointed here and there to what I wanted her to focus on. It’s most hard to prioritize the dirt. Rest assured, I had made lists to prepare for this meeting. The refrigerator in and out. The outside of the cabinets. Underneath and inside the microwave. The spices wiped down. The appliances scrubbed. The bathroom rid of mold. Underneath the washing machine cleaned. Basically a list of the things I spend every waking minute avoiding doing or even making eye contact with. She nodded, smiled and politely went to town. And five days later we are still finding precious clean pockets of joy.

“Look, Joe! The kitchen drain is sludge-free!”

“Mere! The top of the refrigerator has been dusted!”

And then Joe made some snarky remark about marrying the wrong woman. And I didn’t care because the tub, did you see the tub? I can see my own reflection!

Four hours later, she left apologizing for not mopping which I hadn’t even asked her to do. The love multiplied.

Down to business, I paid her 65 dollars via Paypal but you can also pay in cash, I believe. The details that you’ll need about exactly what services, exactly how much, exactly how to contact and such are at their WEBSITE.

Narumi May is the kind woman at the helm of this solid operation. And another operation. She also manages a Japanese language & translation program.

All in all, a superb thing went down here in my house. Now you know.

17 COMMENTS

  1. Sending this on behalf of my wife; so when we requested services from GHO we were very impressed. They did more than what was expected. The first clean they sent to ladies in and they were great! We got “their” names and we requested “their” services after that. A few weeks later we contacted GHO and requested the same ladies to come out and it was booked and scheduled. After my wife came home she felt a “disturbance in the force”; the house was not cleaned like it was the first time. When she called GHO she asked for the name of who “cleaned” the house. When they gave the name, my wife asked… “Is that a man’s name?” they answered back as yes. Looks like the ladies that we requested were not available so they sent 1 person; a man at that to come and clean the house. My wife was a bit upset at that. So they offered to send the ladies back to re-clean the house at no charge. After cleaning the house a third time they broke a little statue that my wife liked but they had already sent us an e-mail and a picture of the broken statue and offered to replace it. Few months later still have not heard from them.

  2. My name is Kirk Sheppard and I am the owner of On Time Cleaning and have been in business in Okinawa for 12 years and we are another home cleaning options for you. We can provide cleaning services to Camp Foster, Camp Lester, Camp McTureous, Camp Courtney and Kadena Air Base and all our cleaners have access to all bases. Please call me directly for any questions you have at 090-829-29431 or email kirk.sheppard@on-timegroup.com and I will be happy to answers any question you have or visit http://www.ontimeclean.com for services options.

    All new customers receive $25.00 off your first cleaning and if you introduce our service to your friends and receive another $25.00 discount on your next cleaning.

  3. All these reviews are negative. But I have been using GHO since August 2014 and am so very pleased with them. They will pick up anything we leave behind, wash the dishes, clean our bathrooms, tables, and so on and so on. I love coming home on housekeeping day!

  4. I contacted GHO this past Monday for a cleaning of my home. The lady on the phone gave me a quote of $160 for a deep cleaning or a regular cleaning for $89. I requested a deep cleaning because it included cleaning the fridge, stove, windows, vents, and scrubbing the floors. The lady over the phone asked me how often I wanted the cleaning and I told her I was going to try them out first and see how well they did and then I would do at least twice a month. After signing a contract and confirming a date for Wednesday cleaning she then mentioned they took the money ahead of time and only in cash. I said this was fine and gave her directions to my home. Wednesday came and I was so looking forward to coming home from work to a nice clean house. When I arrived to my home I noticed the porch was not cleaned. At first I thought… this is something I can do myself, not a big deal. When I walked in I immediately noticed the floors were not swept or moped, windows were not cleaned, vents still had the dust, the fans still had dust, the bathtubs were not cleaned, the kids bed sheets were never changed… I can go on and on. Pretty much the only thing that was done was a lousy job of the dining table being wiped down and our bed made. I was extremely disappointed. I called all three of their phone numbers plus their emergency number and left a message. Never heard back. I sent emails and called again this morning and it was not until 11 am someone answered their phone. I spoke to a young lady and explained to her what I came home to and also let her know that I sent pictures of my floors to their email. I requested to have my home cleaned again or to have my money refunded. They offered to come out to clean again. They excuse I was given for the poor cleaning was that they spent 8 hours organizing my home! Come to find out they were only really at my home for 2 hours. Made me wonder what the heck they were doing for 2 hours! Well they came out today and I am still displeased with the service. The floors were swept and moped and the bathrooms were cleaned. Still they never cleaned the vents, the ceiling fans, the windows or the porch. So… Never again will I use them. Definitely not $160 worth.

    • We also tried Good Housekeeping. Had the same experience with the maid not showing up. They never contacted us about it. When we did, they gave us some excuse. Scheduled two people to come a few days later. Well, I wish nobody had showed up again. They stole from us! My husband and I couldn’t be more surprised or angry. We tried to contact them about it but haven’t heard back. DO NOT use that company!

  6. I’m not happy with Good Housekeeping Okinawa either, the housekeepers who cleaned my house were talking on the phone, smoking cigarettes while on duty. For $200 I expect them to get done more than a small kitchen and a living room. Unacceptable.

  7. I hired Good Housekeeping Okinawa for a deep clean and told them if I liked my service I *might* hire them twice monthly, but my experience was terrible.

    After quoting me prices, they asked me to sign a blank contract. The contract stated things like ‘I agree to pay xxx'” and ‘I agree to hire GHO every week or twice weekly or monthly, and will be charged a fee if the housekeepers cannot enter the house’. Red flag!!

    They quoted me in writing $200 for a deep clean and $68 for regular clean, but when I asked them to fill in the contract before I signed it, they raised their prices. I was told Yen payments only or exchange rate equivilent: 20,000 Yen or $266 deep clean, 6,800 Yen or $90.

    They agreed to a one-time cleaning for $200, and said they will only accept Yen after that. I know someone who had their house cleaned after I did, and not only did she pay $68 in USD, they never mentioned to her having to pay Yen.

    On to the cleaning….

    They told me to tell them my areas of concern, and told me that they only guarantee that those places get cleaned. My priority was to have the floors swept, vacuumed and mopped and my bathrooms completely scrubbed and cleaned. They didn’t mop my floors!! They spot cleaned, but missed several spots. I had to scrub the tile in my bathroom myself because they didn’t. They didn’t sweep/mop underneath my bedside table, but had time to re-arrange the dolls in my daughter’s room, so obviously they didn’t prioritize.

    They guarantee to come back and clean if it wasn’t done right, and I e-mailed them and told them what they guaranteed to clean wasn’t cleaned, but they never responded.

    THEN they scheduled another cleaning without my permission for the following week! They sent me an e-mail stating that if I didn’t cancel within their time frame I would be charged anyway. Fortunately I happened to check my e-mail and saw they had scheduled me. I was able to cancel, but what they did was wrong.

    I heard many great things about them from others, so my experience was disappointing. Perhaps they were great in the past, but they are currently doing things that could be dangerous, like asking people to sign blank contacts and signing someone up for a house cleaning (that they will be charged for!!) without their permission. It’s hard to cancel an appointment you don’t know anything about!!!

  8. Wow….I guess times are tough all around here in Okinawa and Japan. I just gotta let everyone know that I am really happy with what I got from Good Housekeeping! They were completely professional and cleaned my house in under 4 hours. A blessing to me and I’m happy to pay them for the whole time cause I needed it.

    I’ll definitely use them again and they are 5 stars in my book! ….that’s 5 stars out of 5 🙂

  9. I am Not Happy with Good Housekeeping either!!! I have called and e-mailed to set up an apt., it’s two weeks later and still have had no response. I feel as if they are very unprofessional. If they don’t have any availability the least they can do is get back with me and let me know.

  10. I am not happy at all with Good Housekeeping Okinawa. They did not return my phone call about needing to set up an appt for someone to come out and clean my home. And when I finally called them back, I set up an appt for someone to come out, she didn’t show up on the appointed day. I called them once again with a promise for them to call me back within 30 minutes to let me know what happened and they never called me back! I’m not HAPPY!!!

  11. We had the Good Housekeeping Okinawa deep cleaning service done today. There were supposed to be 3 workers for 4 hours but one of them was a no show so the we had 2 workers for 6 hours. They were friendly, courteous, hardworking and thorough.

    We live in a large older house so it isn’t the easiest to clean but they made it sparkle. They collected the original quoted price $200.

    We will use this company again.

  14. Thank you for the recommendation! We have been looking for a service like this for a while.

    We are live in a two bedroom house and just setup an appointment with Good Housekeeping Okinawa. We chose their Deep Cleaning service.

    We were quoted 200$ by phone. They were very flexible with the dates and pleasant to speak with. I will post the rest after the service! Thank you Yamada San!!!