Your Guide to Creating a Workplace Cleaning Policy

Posted by admin, September 01, 2018

In business, as in every aspect of life, it’s all too easy to become so involved with managing the everyday tasks and challenges of the working day that we lose sight of big, important issues.

Take the cleaning of your premises, for instance. If you were to forget the underlying purpose of the activity, it would be easy to treat it as a cosmetic, tick-box operation.

However, office cleaning is just a means to a hugely-important end – the health and safety of your employees and, depending on the nature of your business, of your customers and suppliers.  Indeed, under UK health and safety laws, every organisation must take the right precautions to provide a clean and safe working environment.

Hence this respectful reminder of the need for a coherent and comprehensive Cleaning Policy.

As your appointed cleaning company, it’s our responsibility to help you formulate a clear and stated Cleaning Policy which will inform all of the operations that we undertake on your behalf. To this end, we’ve listed below some areas that should be covered in your policy.

We should say that every such policy will be different, reflecting the sector you work in and the precise nature of your business

1. Common Staff Areas

Staff rooms are often used for preparing and eating food, so should be kept scrupulously clean – especially work surfaces, microwaves and fridges, sinks and waste bins.

In informing your staff about your Cleaning Policy (crucial if it’s to have a positive effect) you should impress upon them that they have a personal responsibility to look after common areas. Employees shouldn’t simply expect us, or you, to clean up after them. You could encourage them to:

• dispose of out-of-date food in the fridge
• ensure food is only eaten in designated places
• clean kitchen utensils after us

2. Hygiene

You might think it’s unnecessary to reinforce employees’ awareness of personal hygiene, but unfortunately this is often not the case. Posters on notice-boards and in washrooms can help to reduce avoidable infections and promote a culture of cleanliness and consideration for others.

3. The workspace

The average desktop harbours 20,961 germs per square inch – and that’s on top of the 3,295 on the keyboard, the 1,676 on the mouse and the staggering 25,127 on the telephone. And yet many employees choose to eat at their work stations!

Eating lunch ‘al-desko’ carries a real risk of infection – not to mention the cumulative harm caused by remaining sedentary for long periods.

 In any case, your Cleaning Policy should urge employees to maintain their working space in a clean and tidy state.

4. Keeping current

The Cleaning Policy is not an ‘off the shelf’ document. It reflects the precise and unique needs of each client. Nor is it a fixed or static document, but should be regularly reviewed in the light of changing technology and Health & Safety regulations.

5. Putting in place a coherent Cleaning Policy

At Glenn, as you will have gathered, we attach great importance to this document. We work with our clients to ensure that effective policies and practices are in place and that all legislative requirements are met.

If you would value our further advice, or would like more information about our comprehensive range of services, please call 01234 404242.