‘Three bedrooms on the eighth floor of NEO Bankside, two years of dinner parties, and the agent gave us four days’ notice on the check-out.’ That’s how Marta described her hand-back last March, and that’s roughly the brief we get for half the SE1 work between London Bridge and the Tate. Glassy modern flats, riverside views, deposits in the £4,000-£8,000 range, and inventory clerks who photograph everything twice.
Last updated April 2026. Monster Cleaning Ltd, trading since 2014, Companies House 9919639. HQ at 255 Upper Richmond Road West, SW14 8QS. Phone 0333 555 2076, email [email protected].
“I had Knight Frank’s clerk in at 9am on a Monday, the moving van booked for 11, and the kitchen extractor hadn’t been touched since the day we moved in. Monster came on the Saturday, did the whole eighth-floor flat in seven hours, and the clerk knocked off £180 for a scratch on the parquet and signed the rest off. We got £4,580 back from a £4,800 deposit. The cleaner who turned up actually knew which spray to use on the porcelain worktop, which surprised me.” – Marta R., NEO Bankside, March 2026
Why deposits get deducted around Southwark Cathedral
The single biggest reason a deposit shrinks in SE1 is not damage. It is cleaning. Tenancy Deposit Scheme adjudicators have said for years that cleaning sits at the top of the dispute list, and around Bankside the gap between a tenant’s idea of clean and an inventory clerk’s idea of clean is wider than the river. A £4,500-a-month flat does not get checked at the same standard as a £1,200 ex-LA conversion in Peckham. The clerk has been briefed by the agent, the agent has been briefed by the freeholder, and the freeholder wants the next viewing booked the same week.
The other deductions stack up in a recognisable order. Limescale on the brushed-nickel fittings, because the water here is hard and most modern flats have walk-in showers with glass screens that scale visibly within a week. Grease film on the underside of the extractor hood, which on a pyrolytic cooker setup is the part nobody pyrolyses. Dust along the top edge of every floor-to-ceiling window frame, which is where the clerk’s torch goes first. Smudges on the white wall by the lift door inside the flat. Marks on the resin-bonded kitchen island. Hoover trails missed under the bed.
Renters’ Rights Act 2025
The Renters’ Rights Act 2025 took out the old fixed-term assured shorthold and replaced it with a periodic-only structure, so most of our SE1 tenants now hand back on two months’ notice from either side. Nothing in that Act changed the cleaning standard at check-out. The deposit cap is still five weeks’ rent under five grand a year and six weeks above, and the deposit must still be protected with one of three schemes within thirty days of receipt. On NEO Bankside rents that means deposits genuinely sit at £4,500-£8,500 for a two- or three-bed, and that money is what we are working to get back.
If a deduction is challenged, the dispute goes to the scheme’s adjudicator. Practical reading on that process from Tenancy Deposit Scheme and mydeposits both say the same thing in different words: the side with timestamped photographs and a professional invoice tends to win. We invoice with our company number on the document, give you twelve dated pre- and post-clean photos per room, and email the receipt within twenty-four hours.
Southwark Council licensing
Southwark’s selective licensing scheme covers nineteen wards across the borough as of November 2023 and runs until February 2027. The London Bridge & West Bermondsey ward is in the scheme, which means landlords in SE1 between Borough Market and Tower Bridge have to hold a selective licence as well as the usual HMO licences for shared homes. Practically that translates to better-kept records, more frequent landlord inspections during the tenancy, and a check-out report that gets read more carefully than it would in a non-licensed area. Cleaning failures get noted in those reports.
Bankside-specific feature: hard water plus a lot of glass
Thames Water’s London supply runs around 280-300 mg/l calcium carbonate, which is firmly in the very hard band. Thames Water’s own hardness page publishes the figure for SE1 supply zones. The Bankside problem is what that hardness lands on. New-builds along Holland Street and Sumner Street are full of glass shower doors, brushed-steel taps, polished concrete worktops and the occasional Corian island. Limescale builds visibly in two or three weeks on any of those, and a clerk standing in a south-facing flat at 11am will see every patch the cleaner missed because the river light bounces off everything.
We descale the shower glass with a non-acidic cream that won’t haze the brushed nickel. We do the kettle and the iron with a weak descaler appropriate to the metal underneath. We never use anything aggressive on Corian, because Corian scratches and the repair bill from the manufacturer is more than the entire clean. If you want the technical detail, ask when you book.
Coverage – streets and zones we work
Most of our SE1 EOT work sits between Blackfriars Bridge to the west and Tower Bridge to the east, with the Cathedral and Borough Market roughly in the middle. The buildings we do most often:
- NEO Bankside on Holland Street and Sumner Street, the four pavilions behind the Tate. Two- and three-bed flats with floor-to-ceiling glass, polished concrete floors, an open-plan kitchen-living layout that needs end-to-end attention.
- Bankside Lofts, the Manhattan Loft Corporation conversion of a 1950s office and a Victorian cocoa warehouse, on Hopton Street. 120 loft apartments, double-height ceilings, exposed brick, mostly hardwood floors.
- The flats above Hop Exchange on Southwark Street and the converted spaces on Park Street, where the warehouse stock has been turned into one- and two-bed apartments with original cast-iron columns.
- Borough Walk, Borough High Street and the Bermondsey Street end, modern infill above retail.
- The More London-adjacent blocks on Tooley Street, Cottons Lane and Battle Bridge Lane, between the Shard’s foot and Tower Bridge.
- Cathedral Yard and Montague Close, the small cluster of period-detail flats actually within the Cathedral precinct.
If you live in one of the older period buildings on the south side of Southwark Street or in a Bedale Street flat near the market, we cover those too. The work is usually slightly different – older floors, smaller kitchens, more scaling in the bathroom because the pipework is shorter and the heating runs hotter.
What’s included
End of tenancy is the hand-back clean. Deep is for staying. Regular is for keeping it tidy. The work below is the first one – the 57-point agent-approved checklist that gets a flat past Knight Frank, Foxtons, Wallaker, Field & Sons or Galliard’s check-out clerks. Every line is the same whether the flat is a £207 studio off Borough High Street or a £425 four-bed at NEO Bankside. The price changes; the work doesn’t.
Kitchen
Inside the oven, including the back wall, the door glass between the panes where the manufacturer says do not separate it (we ignore that), the trim, the seal, the racks washed in the sink. Pyrolytic ovens still get manually scrubbed because the self-clean function leaves ash. Hood and extractor filter, degreased and refitted. Hob, including the gaps between the induction zones where crumbs collect. Splashback, including the silicone bead at the worktop joint. Inside every cupboard and drawer, fronts polished, handles wiped. Dishwasher seal and filter. Fridge inside and out, including the rubber gasket around the door. Bin housing, descaled if there is one. Sink and tap, descaled, polished. Floor.
Bathrooms
Shower glass on both sides, descaled to the hinge. Showerhead, hose, every surface of the brushed fittings. Tile grout. Loo inside and behind the cistern. Sink, overflow, tap. Mirror without streaks. Extractor cover. Floor. If the flat has a separate WC, the same list runs again.
Bedrooms and living areas
Skirtings, picture rails where they exist, the tops of every door frame, the radiators front and behind, all switch plates and sockets. Wardrobes inside and out. Mirrored sliding doors descaled and streak-free. Floor-to-ceiling windows on the inside, including the bottom track where dust collects under the sliding door. Hoovering on a pattern that doesn’t leave trail marks on a polished wood floor.
Throughout
All internal doors both sides. Door handles. Light fittings dusted, including the recessed downlights. Stair handrails if it’s a maisonette. The lift call button if you have a private lift. Skirtings at carpet level vacuumed and wiped. The flat’s hallway floor finished last so we walk out clean.
What it costs around Southwark Cathedral
Pricing for SE1 sits at our premium tier because the buildings, the deposits and the inventory standards are all premium. Flat rates below for an empty flat in average condition; lived-in or pet-occupied gets quoted on inspection.
| Property | EOT flat rate |
|---|---|
| Studio | £207 |
| 1-bed | £243 |
| 2-bed | £339 |
| 3-bed | £339 |
| 4-bed | £425 |
Hourly rate for partial work or unusual scope is £30 per cleaner. Carpet shampoo where it’s needed runs at £36 per bedroom, £43 for a living room, £115 for a whole two-bed flat. Oven add-ons (rare on these jobs because oven is in the EOT scope already, but useful for double-oven or 90cm range setups outside the standard package): £77 single, £110 double, £114 for a 90cm range. We don’t charge for travel inside the M25.
Why the SE1 premium. Building access at NEO Bankside takes a fob and a concierge sign-in, and we account for the time it takes to load three cleaners’ kit through a residents’ lift on a service-window appointment. The clerks here mark to a higher standard. The work needs the senior team. We pay them for it.
What your agent will actually check
Knight Frank, Foxtons and Wallaker run inventory check-outs through specialist firms. The clerks work to a script. Across SE1 the consistent inspection points, in roughly the order they get hit:
- The kitchen extractor underside and the filter cassette – lifted, checked, photographed.
- Behind and underneath the cooker, including the gap behind the kickboard.
- The shower glass, both sides, in raking light from the river-facing window. Hard-water haze shows up immediately.
- The top edge of every floor-to-ceiling window frame, run with a finger.
- The dishwasher filter and the rubber seal around the door.
- Inside every wardrobe rail and across the top shelf, where dust is the failure mode.
- The toilet rim, the hinge bolts, the cistern lid.
- Skirtings throughout, especially at the kitchen-living transition where the skirting changes material.
- Carpet edges where they meet hard floor, run with a torch from low angle.
- The shower drain hair trap.
- The fridge gasket and the freezer drawer runners.
- The bath panel where it tucks under the bath – dust and hair both collect there.
If our team has been through the flat properly, every one of those points has been done before the clerk arrives. We carry torches.
How booking works
- You phone 0333 555 2076 or email [email protected] with the postcode, the bedroom count, and the date the agent has booked the check-out. We reply same working day.
- We confirm the slot, the team size, the access details (concierge, fob, key safe, agent-held keys) and any add-ons. NEO Bankside, Bankside Lofts and most of the modern blocks need a service-lift booking; we make that call.
- You leave the flat empty by 8am on the day. If furniture is staying for the new tenant, we work around it.
- The team works through the 57-point checklist top-to-bottom. Average two-bed at NEO Bankside takes two cleaners about six hours. Three-beds run seven to nine.
- We send you the photo set the same evening. If the clerk flags anything within seventy-two hours, we come back and put it right. That’s the 48-hour re-clean guarantee, and it’s why our 97% first-time pass rate isn’t a marketing line.
Related services and neighbouring areas
For specialist add-ons we run separate oven cleaning service, carpet shampoo on hardwood-edge installs, upholstery, internal window cleaning for Bankside floor-to-ceiling glass and after-builders cleans for refit projects. The hub for the whole borough is the Southwark end of tenancy cleaning page. Sibling neighbourhoods we work in regularly are Borough, Bermondsey, London Bridge and Waterloo.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does end of tenancy cleaning cost around Southwark Cathedral?
Studio £156, one-bed £207, two-bed £243, three-bed £339, four-bed £425. SE1 is on our premium tier because of building-access overhead and inventory standards. Hourly partial work runs at £30 per cleaner.
Do you cover NEO Bankside?
Yes, regularly. We’ve worked the four pavilions on Holland Street and Sumner Street since the building opened. We know the service-lift booking process at the concierge and we account for the time in the quote.
Can you handle Bankside Lofts and the Hopton Street warehouse stock?
Yes. Loft layouts with double-height ceilings need a step ladder for the upper window panels and the exposed-brick edges. We bring the kit. Mostly hardwood floors, which we hoover-and-mop rather than shampoo unless there’s a stain.
How fast can you get to a SE1 flat?
Same-week is normal. Same-day is sometimes possible for studios and one-beds if you phone before 9am. The bottleneck on premium blocks is the residents’ lift slot, not our team availability.
What’s the 48-hour re-clean guarantee?
If the inventory clerk flags any cleaning failure within seventy-two hours of our finish, we come back at no charge and fix it. We’ve had to use it on roughly three out of every hundred jobs – that’s where the 97% first-time pass rate comes from.
What does the 57-point agent-approved checklist cover?
The full list of inspection points the major SE1 letting agents work to – kitchen interior, oven and extractor, all bathrooms top-to-bottom, every bedroom and living area surface, throughout the flat, and the access points. We’ve built it from working with 300+ letting agents over twelve years.
Have you really recovered £1.2m in deposits for tenants?
Across the company since 2014, yes. £1.2m is the running total of deposit money that would otherwise have gone to deductions but came back to tenants on flats we cleaned. It’s audited internally each January.
Is the water around Southwark Cathedral hard?
Very hard. Thames Water reports the SE1 supply zones at around 280-300 mg/l calcium carbonate. That’s why limescale on shower glass and brushed fittings is the second-most common deduction reason after general grime.
Do you bring your own equipment?
Yes. Hoover, mop, microfibre system, descalers appropriate to the surface (non-acidic on brushed nickel and porcelain worktops, weak descaler on kettles, never abrasive on Corian), and full PPE. You don’t supply anything.
Will the work pass a Knight Frank check-out?
97% of the time on the first attempt. The other 3% get the re-clean callback within seventy-two hours and pass on the second.
What about pets and stains?
If the flat had pets we quote on inspection. Pet hair on a polished concrete floor is straightforward. Pet hair worked into a wool-mix runner is a separate carpet job at £36 per room. Smell treatment is extra and we’ll be honest about whether it’ll work.
Do you do oven cleaning as a standalone?
Yes, single oven £77, double £110, 90cm range £114. On an EOT package the oven is included in the headline price; we only charge the add-on when it’s outside the standard scope or you’ve booked oven-only.
Are you insured?
Public liability £5m and employer’s liability £10m, with documentation available before the visit if your building requires it. Most of the SE1 concierges have us on file already.
Do you accept commercial bookings from agents?
Yes. We invoice agents on thirty-day terms with a company number on the document. Most of our SE1 work comes through the letting and managing agents directly.
What if my flat is shared and the other tenant is staying?
We clean the rooms you’re vacating to EOT standard plus the shared kitchen and bathroom. Standalone bedroom rate is the studio rate; full shared-flat is quoted on inspection.
Where can I read more about deposit disputes?
The TDS deposit-disputes page at tenancydepositscheme.com is the clearest. The mydeposits adjudication notes are also useful. Shelter’s tenancy deposit guidance covers the legal end.
Ready to book
Phone 0333 555 2076 or email [email protected] with the postcode, the bedroom count and the date your agent has set for check-out. We reply same working day. Most of our SE1 work books a week ahead; concierge buildings sometimes need ten days.
For the legal context on cleaning standards and the renting framework you can read gov.uk on tenancy deposit protection and check Southwark’s licensing guidance directly. The deposit scheme websites listed above are the dispute-process source of record.