Building service contractors know that restrooms are a customer hot spot, yet many BSCs underestimate the level of organization necessary to properly perform basic restroom care. But the failure to implement a uniform cleaning system can be disastrous.

If a cleaning employee enters a restroom and decides to change the toilet paper first, but gets distracted and starts cleaning the mirrors, he or she may easily forget to replace the rest of the stalls’ toilet paper. Other essentials, such as refilling soap or emptying trash, also are easily overlooked.

“If I have employees who don’t understand proper cleaning techniques and organization, I run the risk of cleaning in a haphazard way, which often results in customer complaints,” says Laura Dellutri, president of America’s Cleaning Connection, an Omaha, Neb.-based janitorial firm and cleaning referral service.

The advent of more systemized cleaning steps and more ergonomic tools has helped reduce estimated cleaning times by more than half in the last decade, according to the International Sanitary Supply Association’s Cleaning Times. In 1994, the book estimated it would take about 27 minutes to empty trash, clean and disinfect fixtures (sinks, toilets and urinals), wipe mirrors, replace supplies and sweep a floor in a restroom containing 9 fixtures. The 1999 revised edition of Cleaning Times estimated the same tasks should take about 14.75 minutes.

Taking these published times and other industry factors into consideration, many contractors estimate that workers should be able to clean and restock a restroom at a rate of approximately 2.5 minutes times the number of relevant fixtures. Unorganized cleaning often takes up to twice as long.

“But if the restroom’s not being cleaned every day, it will be dirtier and it will take extra time to clean around fixtures,” says Debra Olson, building service manager for Kettle Moraine Professional Cleaning, Inc., a Wis.-based cleaning company, creating another argument for consistent cleaning on a regular basis.

Step-by-step
Working in a systematic fashion not only increases time efficiency, it also helps ensure quality cleaning. “Employees may not be putting 100 percent concentration into their jobs while they’re cleaning,” says James Cahill, director of training for Janitronics, an Albany, N.Y.-based building service company. “But if you can train them to work in a systematic way, they can be effective in their jobs without missing any cleaning steps.”

Industry experts agree that restroom cleaning involves several steps performed in a specific order. First, it is important to close the restroom to prevent users’ interference.

Employees then begin by spraying all surfaces with disinfectants, which need “dwell time,” usually two to five minutes, to kill germs and bacteria.

While the disinfectant is working, it is time to restock items such as hand soap, toilet tissue, trash liners, paper towels, facial tissue, urinal blocks and sanitary napkins. “Restocking is something that’s easy to forget if it’s not done in the beginning,” says Dellutri.

Dry cleaning — starting at the top of the restroom and dusting the ceiling, tops of partitions, ceiling vents and tops of mirrors and ledges — is next. The employee uses a dust cloth on a wand or a similar tool to clean areas that can’t be reached by hand.

Then it is time to clean mid-range areas of the restroom, including fixtures. Cahill recommends starting in the left corner of the restroom by the door, and working to the left through the entire restroom until the end point — the right side of the door — is reached. Then, spot clean all contact surfaces — mirrors, sinks, doorknobs, light switches, faucets, the outside of toilets and urinals, partitions, walls and doors.

The inside of toilets and urinals should be cleaned next, according to Cleveland Johnson, franchise development director and registered executive housekeeper for Coverall, a Chicago-based cleaning franchise. Bowl cleaner is applied with a johnny mop, which is made of cloth material so it won’t scratch porcelain. All toilets and urinals are scrubbed systematically, and water rings are eliminated by scrubbing above and below the water line.

The final step is cleaning the restroom floors, which are typically swept and then wet mopped. It is important to wring out the mop completely and mop the floor until dry.

Another suggested pattern for cleaning, used to determine the ISSA Cleaning Times, places tasks in a different order, but still in a circular pattern. The first task is placing solution in toilets or urinals so the chemicals can take effect while the worker moves on to refilling all dispensers and emptying trash. Then, do top-to-bottom dusting and sweeping, along with spot cleaning mirrors and doors. Then, the person returns to the urinals and toilets to scrub and flush, lastly disinfecting the floor with a wet mop.

Employee training
Dellutri stresses that employee training is the foundation of effective and efficient cleaning systems no matter what order the tasks are done. “We train our employees using the tell, show and do method,” she says. This involves explaining the cleaning system, taking them into restrooms to demonstrate proper cleaning procedures and observing their first cleaning attempts.

Dellutri also follows up to make sure her employees are accountable for their cleaning efficiency. She not only estimates how long it will take employee to clean a restroom, but she also gives them individual job tickets, detailings duties for each shift and how long each cleaning job should take. Then she times the workers to make sure they are on schedule.

Lynne Knobloch is a business writer based in Mishawaka, Ind.




POSTED ON: 3/1/2001