Cleaning · Published 17 April 2026 · 6 min read
Cleaning contracts almost never fail at the start. They fail quietly, about eight months in.
Cleaning is the service clients complain about most, and the one specified worst. A contract that says "daily office cleaning to a high standard" is not a specification — it is a sentence that means whatever the supplier needs it to mean when someone complains.
Specify by area and frequency, not by adjective
A usable specification lists every area and every task against a frequency. Reception floors daily. Glazed partitions weekly. High-level dusting monthly. Carpet extraction twice a year, in named months.
This is dull to produce and it is the single thing most likely to keep standards where you agreed. If a task is not written down, nobody is accountable for it, and the first time it comes up will be an argument.
Why contracts drift
- Staff turnover. The person who knew the building leaves, the replacement is briefed verbally, and the specification lives in a drawer.
- Silent substitution of hours. Nothing is announced; a site quietly moves from two cleaners to one and a half.
- Periodic works deferred. Deep cleans and floor restoration are the easiest things to push into next quarter, repeatedly.
- Audits nobody sees. A supplier auditing itself and reporting only the score is marking its own homework.
What to build into the contract
- A written specification by area and task frequency, appended to the contract rather than referenced vaguely
- Named site staff and a named supervisor, with a stated approach to cover during absence
- Monthly audits against that specification, scored, photographed and shared in full
- A threshold below which a rectification plan is automatic, with dates
- Periodic works calendared to named months at contract start
- A quarterly review that can change the specification as the building's use changes
That last point gets missed. Buildings change — a floor is sublet, a canteen opens, occupancy doubles. A specification written three years ago for a different pattern of use will be met perfectly and still leave the place looking wrong.