With a busy and hectic working schedules, most Singaporeans living in this urban metropolis don’t have the time to clean up after themselves. After a tiring day at work, most of us just want to laze on the couch and munch on chips instead of picking up the crumbs. Singapore is a “clean and green” city, but this city isn’t magically maintained by civic-minded Singaporeans. It’s public cleanliness is upheld by an army of 70,000 professional cleaners twice the size of the Singaporean military force. Now, even private spaces have to be upheld by an armada of part-time cleaners.

Cleaning startups that are sprouting all over the country seem to be capitalising on the city’s growing demand for cleaners by creating “Next-Gen” fuss-free online platforms for you to book your next cleaning session. A quick Google search will reveal to you the countless number of businesses that have been set up, offering almost identical services. We’ve covered a variety of them, including The Sunday Crew, Helpling, and Sendhelper. To be honest, this market seems fairly saturated.

But despite all this, there’s still a new startup that’s joining the fold — Fuss.sg. Will Fuss.sg be able to survive this competitive market? Let’s compare some of these startups to see how they differ.

Fuss.sg

Fuss.sg, like many other cleaning startups, simply requires you to; 1. Register, 2. Book an Appointment, 3. Pay Online. After which, an independent cleaner would arrive at your home to perform the necessary cleaning services for a flat rate of $20/hour. Pretty standard.

Pricing:

Champ: Helpling

For one-off booking fees, Helpling, TheSundayCrew and Fuss.sg provide the same rates at a flat $20/hour. However, Helpling and TheSundayCrew offer cheaper rates for recurring weekly/bi-weekly cleaning services at $17/hour(Helpling) and $18/hour(TheSundayCrew). So, pricing-wise, Helpling seems to be the cleaning service of choice.

If you choose to cancel your booking, these cleaning startups will penalize you in different ways. Helpling will freeze your account (no more part-time cleaners for you) if frequent cancellations are being made whilst Fuss.sg will refund you your booking fees minus $15(which means a cancellation fee of $15). Provided you aren’t a frequent cancel-er, Helpling still seems to offer a better deal.

Customer Service:

Champ: None

All these cleaning services claim to thoroughly vet through their cleaners through face-to-face interview and only employ Singaporeans or Singapore Permanent Residents, so you will most definitely have a cleaner that is legally permitted to work in Singapore cleaning your home. All these cleaners will also not bring along their own cleaning supplies so do make sure you house has the necessary supplies needed.

All of the cleaning startups provide customer service that seek to help you with your queries as soon as possible. If you are unsatisfied with your cleaning session, simply contact customer support and they will arrange for another cleaner to be sent to your house to perform the service free of charge. It’s pretty standard across the board.

Convenience:

Champ: Helpling

These cleaning services all allow you to book your appointments online, no difference there. However, Helpling has a mobile app, which increases the convenience of these bookings, so you truly get the Uber-Cleaner experience.

Conclusion

This market is most definitely saturated. These startups offer similar prices (with minor differences) and almost identical promises. Having more startups in this overcrowded market isn’t a good news for new competitors or incumbents as new entrants will merely increase the supply and reduce profits for each firm.

Fuss.sg doesn’t seem to be any different from the existing companies out there and in fact, offers less attractive pricing packages. It’s also clear that Fuss.sg’s biggest competitor is Rocket Internet’s Helpling, and currently they don’t seem to be faring well against them. So if it wishes to succeed, it has better step its game up and offer a wider variety of services or something else to differentiate itself from the crowd.