11 Terms And Conditions Your Janitorial Contract Should Contain:
How much time do you spend reviewing your janitorial contract or proposal before signing it? If you’re like most business owners, you don’t have the time or desire to read through every detail. You probably scan through it and look at the cleaning specs, price, cancellation terms and insurance coverage. While these sections are important, you might want to look at your proposal in a little more detail before signing on the dotted line.
Proposals can provide helpful insights about the cleaning company before you hire them. But, reading through the gory details of a proposal can take time. That’s why we’ve developed this quick 11-point checklist to streamline the process and help you hire the right cleaning company this time around.
Your 11-Point Cleaning Proposal Checklist:
1) The proposal should indicate who your point of contact will be at the cleaning company.
Ace: We assign an account supervisor as your point of contact with our company when service begins.
2) Customer Service: The contract should outline the process by which service requests are handled by the company.
Ace: Your cleaning company should be easy to reach. That’s why we provide an app for a fast, reliable way to communicate with our company. This ensures a prompt response to your service requests.
3) Account start-up: The proposal should indicate how the company handles an account start-up.
Ace: Your account should get off on the right foot. That’s why we provide on site supervision for all account startups. This ensures that all cleaning specs are being met and our customers are satisfied with the service they’re receiving.
4) Inspections and Quality Control. The proposal should outline the quality control measures the cleaning company uses.
Ace: You’ve outsourced the cleaning because you want better results, but you don’t want to spend time overseeing the cleaning crew. That’s why our supervisors perform on-site inspections and stay in close contact with the cleaning crew that is assigned to your account. We supervise our staff so you don’t have to.
5) Employee background checks: The cleaning company should indicate whether or not they run background checks on employees.
Ace: The safety and security of your staff and building is our primary concern. That’s why we run criminal background checks on all our employees prior to working at your facility.
6) Employee eligibility. To maintain compliance with employment statutes, janitorial workers must be eligible to work in the U.S.
Ace: For your protection and ours, we verify that all of our employees are eligible to work in the United States before they are hired.
7) OSHA compliance: Assurance that the company is compliant with OSHA and any regulations regarding janitorial services.
Ace: OSHA compliance is often taken for granted, but is meant to ensure the safety of our employees and your building’s occupants as well. The way in which cleaning solutions are labeled, mixed and used is one example of an important safety issue. We are compliant with all OSHA and State health regulations regarding the performance of janitorial services.
8) Green Cleaning. The type of eco-friendly equipment and supplies should be listed in the proposal.
Ace: Our cleaning supplies, equipment and processes comply with the United States Green Building Council’s guidelines for LEED compliant buildings. Green cleaning includes the use of non-toxic chemicals as well as a host of other supplies and processes to ensure the safety and well being of your building and its occupants. Our proposals contain a list of the green cleaning supplies and equipment we use.
9) Equipment and supplies. Your cleaning company should use high quality, commercial grade equipment, supplies and disinfectants.
Ace: The type of equipment and supplies a company uses can make a big difference in the results you get. Commercial grade equipment, such as vacuums with HEPA filters, microfiber towels and mops and EPA registered disinfectants are a few of the items you should insist on when hiring a commercial cleaning company. For more information about the type of equipment and supplies your cleaning company should be using, read this.
10)Insurance coverage: We provide proof of insurance, including business liability, worker’s compensation and surety bonds.
Ace: Insurance policies should be current and sufficient to protect you in case of an accident or mishap at your facility. We provide copies of all current, applicable insurance policies.
11)Schedule of cleaning tasks: A detailed schedule of the type and frequency of cleaning tasks is provided for comparison.
Ace: The cleaning company should provide a detailed list of the cleaning schedule for your facility. The devil is in the details here. If you outsource the entire cleaning service, then this shouldn’t be a problem. If you hire your own day porters, their responsibilities should be clearly defined to avoid confusion. We can customize a cleaning schedule for your particular needs during our walk through.
Conclusion:
The process of reviewing a proposal may seem easy at first glance. However, if you don’t spend some time looking in your contract for the details on our checklist, you could hire the wrong cleaning company.
Our checklist makes it easy to identify which cleaning companies are likely to provide a high quality service. Most companies will be happy to provide the information on this list if it isn’t in their contracts already. So, if you want a higher level of confidence before you hire the next cleaning company, use our 11-point cleaning contract checklist!
