The cleaning tasks involved in office cleaning are no different to cleaning our homes. We clean floors, dust surfaces, spot clean (to remove finger prints and marks), remove waste (hopefully we separate and recycle our waste) and clean bathrooms.
The big difference between cleaning your home and a commercial office is the size of the area being and the limited amount of time we have to complete this cleaning. We simply do not have the time to clean everything on a daily basis. Herein lies the secrets to effective commercial cleaning.
How do we clean effectively in a limited amount of time?
Firstly, we take a look at our cleaning equipment and chemicals
We have the right cleaning tools, equipment and chemicals.
We select the right tools for the job.
Secondly, we take a look at how we can provide quality professional cleaning in a minimum amount of time. Along with the right tools and equipment we understand the fundamentals of commercial cleaning.
We know there is not enough time to clean everything, every time we clean. So, this means if you clean the same things every day, then you also miss the same things every day, resulting in poor quality cleaning.
The secret to commercial cleaning is rotating cleaning tasks each day! If we cannot clean everything each day, then we rotate our cleaning tasks across the working week, and some of these tasks across a working month. That means we do a small amount of some of these cleaning tasks each day.
However, there are certain things we do EVERY day.
Planning your cleaning
When we start cleaning in a new building it may take a few weeks to properly understand the best way to clean the building. After a short period of time we get to know the dirty people and the clean people in the building; who eats at their table, what they eat and how much rubbish they generate.
There are a number of office cleaning tasks that need to be planned into our daily routine and over a 1-2 week period we should cover all areas of office cleaning.
Some of these tasks include:
Spot cleaning fixtures and fittings
These are the places we all touch such as door knobs, light switches, hand rails and other places we are likely to put our hands.
Dusting
Whilst dust falls every day, it takes time for it to become visible on a surface. Most cleaning specifications require dusting once or twice a week. Dusting an office can take a lot of time and the cleaning specification does not automatically provide an additional few hours for dusting on a weekly basis. We plan dusting into our daily cleaning routine and do a little bit each day and hopefully over a week cover the entire office.
High dusting
High dusting generally covers anything above 1.5-1.8 meters or about head height for most of us. We cannot see this dust so we should not clean these areas as often. A quality cleaning specification should allow for high cleaning once or twice per month.
Planning and managing the time
We do not walk around an area more than once. Because every time we walk around a building, remove waste or return to your storeroom to refill chemicals and consumables we are wasting valuable time, and most cleaning contracts do not have this time to spare.
We make sure we have everything we need on our cleaners trolley before starting your shift. We Divide our area into smaller areas and complete all our cleaning tasks in that area before moving onto the next area.
The MUST Do’s of Cleaning
As a minimum standard, we complete the following cleaning tasks on a daily basis (or every time we clean):
Empty all waste bins and remove waste to designated bins or area.
Spot vacuum litter from carpeted floors and spot clean hard floors to remove marks, dust and dirt.
Spot clean bathrooms and replenish bathroom supplies.
Spot clean high profile and important areas of the building such as entrance doors. Apart from the must dos there are a number of tasks we should complete each day. These being:
The SHOULD Do’s of cleaning
Detail vacuum all high traffic carpeted floors to remove visible litter and dirt.
Detail clean all high profile entrances, lobbies etc. This includes cleaning floors, cleaning door glass and entrance glass, cleaning outside entrances and vacuuming entrance matting.
Spot cleaning tables and desks to remove coffee and food spills and stain.
Detail clean toilets, wash hand basins and clean mirrors in bathrooms.
Spot clean kitchens and activity areas.
A small amount of dusting each week so that over a period of 1-2 weeks all areas are dusted
Routine versus Periodic cleaning
Periodic cleaning is also called Restorative or Project Cleaning. Over a period of time carpets, hard floors, furniture, air-conditioning ducts and ceiling surfaces and fittings build-up dust and soil. This soil is not removed by our routine cleaning procedures.
The frequency of periodic cleaning should be detailed in the buildings cleaning specification.
Special time is allocated to perform these cleaning tasks. These cleaning tasks are often performed by specially trained project cleaning teams.[
About HPFMS – Housekeeping Services in Pune
HPFMS offers a complete housekeeping solution for business houses of all sizes and we have developed a commercial maintenance concept that meets the highest quality standards. Whether you are looking for housekeeping services for office, society or commercial establishment, HPFMS’ goal is to provide you with the best possible results.
Our reputation has been built on a “Quality” approach, which we apply in every housekeeping project we undertake. In addition to using methods that comply with housekeeping standards, all our cleaning products & manpower are best in class.