Has anyone else had issues when taking over a new hostel with existing cleaning contractors?

I've recently moved from running a hostel in London, England for the last nine years to running one in Edinburgh, Scotland. Before I hired and fired but here there is an existing company that does the cleaning (who also is the company that cleans the bars for my bosses' other pubs).
I was asked to come up here to run the place as before there was no manager and the barstaff and at night the cleaners ran the place. As you can expect it wasn't doing as well as it could.
I'm finding myself in an utterly surreal situation where the people who own the cleaning company see to think that they run the hostel.
In the month since I took over I think I've had to sit down with the cleaners and the owner five times and try and sort these problems out. For example yesterday we had to sit down as the night cleaner/porter started an argument with me in front of guests over me raising issue with him not putting the coffee machine on for the guests breakfasts. He out right called me a liar until some of the guests pointed out that they'd just seen me make the coffee. Today I arrive to find that breakfast has been laid out but it is one solitary load of bread dropped onto the kitchen counter. Coffee had been made but he had put a table spoon of coffee into a machine that makes 10 mugs worth.
As requested I contacted the company owner rather than taking issue with the member of staff and I started getting flippant, childish and petty replies to my text.
I'm utterly amazed. I am actually in a power struggle with the cleaning company for the running of the hostel. This can only end badly for them.