A cleaning business runs on repeat visits. The same home every other Tuesday, the same office five nights a week, the same key code, the same note about the dog. Software earns its keep when it remembers all of that, pays your cleaners right and gets the invoice out without a Sunday night at the kitchen table.
This guide sorts the common tools by the job they do, with what each one does and its published price, checked on each vendor's own site. It doesn't rank them. Whether you clean homes or buildings, how many cleaners you have and how clients book decide which ones fit.
The short answer
- Run the visits: A field-service app (Jobber, Housecall Pro, Service Autopilot) or a maid-service app (ZenMaid) for recurring schedules, booking, invoices and payments.
- Run commercial accounts: Janitorial software such as Swept for shifts across buildings, clock-ins and inspections.
- Keep the books: QuickBooks Online or Xero, synced from the scheduling app.
- Answer the phone and texts: A business number for calls and texts, so clients stop texting your cleaners directly.
What cleaning software has to handle
- Two different businesses: Residential (maid service) means many small jobs priced by bedrooms, bathrooms and add-ons, booked online. Commercial (janitorial) means fewer clients, long contracts and night shifts across many sites, where proof of work matters more than booking.
- Recurring schedules: Weekly, every-other-week and monthly visits, ideally with the same cleaner on the same home.
- Notes the cleaner sees on site: Entry codes, alarms, pets, rooms to skip, products the client is allergic to.
- Pay and hours: Clock-ins, pay per job or per hour, and a payroll export or built-in payroll.
- One-off big jobs: Move-outs, post-construction and deep cleans, where a fast quote from square footage and photos wins the job.
- Card on file: Charging automatically after each visit keeps you out of collections.
Field-service management apps
General field-service apps cover many home-service trades, cleaning included. They hold the center of the business: clients, schedule, quotes, invoices and payments.
| Tool | What it does for a cleaning company | Published pricing (checked October 18, 2026) |
|---|---|---|
| Jobber | Online booking, recurring visits, quotes, invoices, online payments and client reminders; higher plans add two-way texting and an AI receptionist | Core from $29/mo billed annually ($49 month to month) for 1 user; Connect from $99/mo ($139) adds reminders and QuickBooks Online sync; Grow from $149/mo ($199) adds two-way texting and job costing; Plus from $399/mo billed annually for 5 users (Jobber pricing) |
| Housecall Pro | Online booking, scheduling and dispatch, estimates, invoices and payments; Essentials adds checklists and photo reports | Basic $79/mo ($59 billed annually), 1 user; Essentials $189/mo ($149), 5 users, adds routes and QuickBooks Online sync; Max $329/mo ($299), 8 users, adds service plans and route optimization (Housecall Pro pricing) |
| Service Autopilot | Scheduling and dispatch, invoicing and payments, and lead management, with an industry page for cleaning | Startup $49/mo, Pro $199/mo, Pro Plus $499/mo, each plus a sign-up fee and priced as annual subscriptions; Elite, which adds two-way texting and QuickBooks integration, is priced on request (Service Autopilot pricing) |
Cleaning-specific software
| Tool | What it does | Published pricing (checked October 18, 2026) |
|---|---|---|
| ZenMaid | Built for residential maid services: calendar, dispatch, invoicing, Stripe or Square payments, automated texts and emails; Pro adds website booking forms and payroll | Starter $19/mo (up to 40 appointments a month), Pro $39/mo (unlimited); a $49 Pro Max plan is marked coming soon. Text messages cost extra, and SMS rates aren't listed (ZenMaid pricing) |
| Swept | Built for commercial janitorial companies: shift scheduling, mobile clock-in, inspections with photos and notes, cleaner and client messaging with announcements in 150+ languages | Optimize from $150/mo, Scale from $225/mo, priced by number of locations; Accelerate custom (Swept pricing) |
If you run both kinds of work, many owners keep one tool for each side rather than forcing night-shift janitorial contracts into an app built around one-off home visits.
Accounting
| Tool | What it does | Published pricing (checked October 18, 2026) |
|---|---|---|
| QuickBooks Online (Intuit) | Bookkeeping, invoices, bills, reports; the accounting app most field-service apps sync with | Simple Start $38/mo, Essentials $85/mo, Plus $140/mo, Advanced $340/mo list, plus a free tier; Intuit often discounts the first months (Intuit pricing) |
| Xero | Bookkeeping, invoices, bank reconciliation, reports | Early $27/mo (20 invoices, 5 bills), Growing $59/mo, Established $97/mo list, with a new-customer promotion at times (Xero US pricing) |
Check the sync before you commit: Jobber lists QuickBooks Online sync from Connect and Housecall Pro from Essentials, per their pricing pages. Keep supplies, mileage and payroll in clean categories so you can see your real margin per home.
Phones and texting
Cleaning clients text. They text to move a visit, to say the gate code changed, to ask if you can add the fridge this week, and to send a photo of a spot that was missed. If those texts go to a cleaner's personal phone, the history leaves when the cleaner does. You have three broad options, and they can mix:
- Phone features inside your field-service app: Jobber's AI Receptionist answers calls and texts and can book the visit during the call using your online booking settings; Jobber's pricing page lists it on Plus and as a $29/mo add-on (Jobber). Housecall Pro's CSR AI answers calls and books jobs, and it sells a separate Voice add-on; neither price is on its pricing page (Housecall Pro). If you want AI that books straight into your schedule, start here.
- A standalone business phone app: For example Quo (formerly OpenPhone): $15 to $47 per user per month depending on plan and billing, with phone menus on its Business and Scale plans. Its Sona AI agent includes 10 calls on every plan, then paid tiers from $25 to $199 a month (Quo pricing, checked October 18, 2026). See our Concierge vs Quo comparison.
- An AI and texting layer next to your app: One business number for calls and texts, an AI that answers every call and text and takes the details, and a shared inbox for the team. This is where Chargezen fits; more below.
Whatever answers, write a short script for the calls that can't wait: a cleaner who didn't arrive, a client locked out or worried about a key, a report of something broken or missing, and a same-day move-out. Those go to the owner or office manager the same day. Write down what the answerer should never agree to without you, such as mold, biohazard or post-construction work priced on the phone.
Sample stacks by company size
These are common patterns, not recommendations.
| Company | Typical stack |
|---|---|
| Solo cleaner | A maid-service or field-service app on its entry plan, QuickBooks Online or Xero, and a business number that answers while you clean |
| Residential team, 3 to 15 cleaners | A field-service or maid-service app with online booking, payroll and card on file, accounting sync, and a shared inbox for calls and texts |
| Commercial janitorial | Janitorial software for shifts and inspections, accounting, and a phone setup that keeps one history per client site |
A checklist for choosing
- Does it handle every-other-week visits and keep the same cleaner on a home?
- Can cleaners see entry codes and notes on their phone, and only for their own jobs?
- Can clients book online with your pricing by bedrooms, bathrooms and add-ons?
- How does it handle pay: per job, per hour, payroll?
- For commercial work: inspections with photos and clock-ins tied to the building?
- How does it sync with your accounting app?
- Who answers a client's call or text at 7 p.m. on a Sunday?
- What does it cost at your team size today, and at twice that size?
How Chargezen helps
Chargezen isn't a field-service app, and it doesn't try to be one. It doesn't book jobs, schedule crews, write estimates or send invoices, and it doesn't connect directly to any of the field-service or accounting apps in this guide today. Keep the app that runs your jobs. Chargezen is the phone, text and AI layer next to it: Concierge, Chargezen's team of digital employees, makes sure every call and text gets an answer and lands in front of your team.
- An AI receptionist on your business number: Concierge answers calls day and night with the greeting you write, answers common questions from what you teach it, and takes the job details for your team. When a caller needs a person, it alerts your team in the Finn app and emails or texts the teammates you pick. See AI receptionist and the phone channel.
- Every text answered: The agent you choose replies to each text on your number, at any hour, and steps back when a teammate takes over. See the SMS autoresponder.
- Your prices and policies, every time: Teach Concierge your service area, price ranges, what a deep clean includes and your cancellation policy. It answers from those facts. See approved answers.
- Photos by text: When a client texts a photo of a stain, a messy oven or a move-out unit, it shows up in the conversation with the rest of the thread, and Concierge can see it when it replies.
- A teammate can join any call: Listen in from the browser or the Finn app, tap Join the call, and Concierge tells the caller you are there.
- Calls and texts in one team inbox: Every call and text lands in the customer's conversation, so whoever picks it up sees the whole history, not a crew member's personal phone. See the team inbox.
- Recordings by your rules: Callers hear your recording notice first, and you choose how long recordings are kept. See call recording.
- The number customers already have: Get a new US local or toll-free number, or bring the number on your trucks and yard signs. See business phone number.
What Chargezen doesn't do on the phone: no phone menu, no ringing a group of phones, and no forwarding calls to personal cell numbers. Concierge answers, and teammates join or take over from it. Your field-service app stays the place where jobs get booked, priced and billed, so a teammate enters the job there from the conversation. If your field-service plan already includes an AI receptionist, use one answering layer, not two.
Concierge Starter is $20 a month with 20,000 credits. Pro is $199 a month with 199,000 credits, or $1,990 a year. Phone and text charges are billed as used. See pricing.
Want to put a number on unanswered calls? Try the missed-call cost calculator with your own figures. Related terms: AI receptionist, MMS and 10DLC. Related guides: stop texting customers from your personal phone, pest control business software and lawn care business software. Software for other trades: plumbing, HVAC, roofing, electrical and painting. See how Concierge answers the phone for cleaning companies, or Concierge for home services.
Frequently asked questions
What software do cleaning businesses use?
Most run a scheduling app (a general field-service app or a maid-service app such as ZenMaid), QuickBooks Online or Xero, and a business phone number. Commercial janitorial companies often use software built for shifts and inspections, such as Swept.
Which cleaning software is cheapest?
Of the published prices we checked on October 18, 2026, ZenMaid's Starter plan starts lowest at $19 a month, for up to 40 appointments a month, with text messages charged on top. Count add-ons such as texting, AI answering and extra users when you compare.
Do I need software to start a cleaning business?
Not on day one. A calendar, a spreadsheet and a business phone number get you through your first handful of clients. Add a scheduling app when you have more recurring homes than you can keep in your head, or your first employee.
Does Chargezen replace Jobber, Housecall Pro or ZenMaid?
No. Chargezen doesn't book, schedule, quote or invoice, and it doesn't connect directly to those apps today. It answers calls and texts, takes the details and puts them in front of your team, who enter the visit in the scheduling app.
