Cleaning offices or other workplaces can be a difficult and time-consuming task. However, keeping your workspace clean is vital, not only for your clients and customers, but also for your employees’ health and wellbeing.
Commercial cleaning companies take on all responsibility for your office and workplace cleaning, freeing you up to focus on your work. It is important to research a commercial cleaning company before hiring them, to make sure you pick the right one for you. Here are 10 things you should consider before hiring a commercial cleaning company.
Professionalism & Authenticity
Although a level of professionalism can be derived from a website or literature, it does not always mean they are authentic. A business run from a bedroom can have the website image of a national company, but there will be clues that they may not be genuine.
The ‘About Us’ page gives details of the company, the more detail, the more open the company is. Additionally, photographs of staff should actually be their staff. You can tell by whether they are wearing company logo shirts, holding correctly coloured cleaning products and whether they have a meet the team element to their literature.
Training
A good commercial cleaning company should be able to provide you with a clear understanding of how a cleaner will be trained for your site, and how they would deal with training issues in the future. They should have visited your site to quote and, should you wish to proceed, a full handover should be done, where access information, specific health and safety points and location of areas, such as external bins, are all confirmed.
Industry Experience
Experience in the industry suggests that a company and the individuals that work for them are trained correctly, are aware of proper cleaning techniques and are skilled in great customer service. A company won’t stay around for long enough to get valuable experience if these points aren’t a main focus.
DBS Checks
The Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) provides a checking service, disclosing any criminal activity that someone may have on record. All individuals in a commercial cleaning company, who work around vulnerable adults and children, should be DBS checked for safeguarding.
Equipment
One of the benefits of hiring a commercial cleaning company is the fact that they provide professional cleaning equipment. The equipment should in good condition and follow infection control practices, such as colour-coding.
It is important to ask where the equipment is stored. For a large office space, storage is not usually a problem however offices with limited space may not be able to keep equipment on site. If you need equipment and chemicals to be brought to site each time, you will need to choose a company who arrive in a company van for each clean, for example a ‘one-man band’. Larger cleaning companies usually keep equipment and chemicals on site and their cleaners may even walk to work.
Customer Service
High-quality customer service should be consistent and continue as long as you work with that company. If you want to know what their customer service is like, contact them via email or phone and ask some relevant questions. If you get fast and informative responses to your queries, it is more likely that this will continue after you become their client.
Insurance
All commercial cleaning companies should be a registered company and be able to provide you with proof of insurance. They should have a comprehensive insurance cover which includes the cover of £10m Employer’s liability, £5m Public Liability, £5m Products Liability and key cover, for example.
Referrals and Reviews
If a business provides a good service, you should be able to find multiple positive reviews either on their website or across social medial platforms, google or review sites.
Cost vs Value
When receiving a commercial cleaning quote, you should expect to see a clear breakdown of cost and what value to expect for that. If it is not clear or areas are hidden, this suggests that the same will be reflected in the service provided.
Contracts and Packages
Every commercial cleaning company will offer different services within different packages. It is important that the contract you take out is specific for the services you require. For example, at aZtec, we offer a ‘no fixed contract’ option, to ensure our clients have the flexibility they need, whilst keeping us on our toes.
When considering hiring a commercial cleaning company for your office or workplace, it is vital that the right research is carried out. By following these 10 steps you can find the best commercial cleaning company for you.
