I've never had one (except Mr Bluemoon, when he can be persuaded) But my mum loved her job and when she was getting on a bit it became a choice between having a cleaner or retirement. There was a lovely lady in the village who had been an industrial cleaner all her life and, like mum, the job was getting too much for her. It was ideal, the lady 'retired' then did three mornings a week for Mum, enabling Mum to carry on with her job until they virtually had to kick her out, change the locks, forcibly confiscate her car-park permit...... well, perhaps not that bad, but she was 66yrs and 51wks old when she finally accepted that she couldn't creatively read the company's policy on retirement any longer. The lady still 'does' for Mum one day a week, but from what I can gather, apart from wiping the skirting boards which Mum has trouble kneeling to reach, it's more of a social thing, they drink lots of tea and it's the way Mum gets to hear all the gossip. The one thing I'd suggest is that you have a definite idea of what needs to be done and let the person you employ know what his/her duties will be. I know that in the early days of Mum's arrangement she left it to the cleaning lady and found that the jobs she really needed doing were being left and things that didn't need doing were done instead - she once took some plastic carrier-bags which were stuffed in a drawer and washed and dried them, Mum came home to find them flapping from the line.