Contract cleaners are hard-working, but they shoot themselves in the foot by paying low wages and bidding accordingly, says Steve Hampsey, buildings and grounds supervisor at the University of New Brunswick, Fredericton, New Brunswick. The University outsources about 85 percent of cleaning services, with in-house staff handling cleaning in the residential areas.

The building service contractors in Hampsey’s area are dealing with the same low unemployment problems and competitive low bidding that many U.S. contractors face. At the same time, Hampsey’s in-house staff is unionized, has had little or no turnover, and are paid higher wages and better benefits than their contracted counterparts.

While he finds contractors in his area willing to do whatever it takes to please their customers, including last-minute services or taking on additional tasks such as lawn care or post-construction clean-up, they just don’t offer the same quality as the in-house workers provide. The reason, Hampsey believes, is their low wages.

“In-house will get $13.50 ($8.60 US)an hour while contract workers get only $6.75 ($4.30 US), yet they’re doing the same function,” he says.

Hampsey is like many other contract cleaning customers in that he wishes the workers could receive more wages, but can’t justify taking a higher bidder over another just for that reason.

“If the industry was paying more an hour, they’d all come in at the same range and we’d have to take a closer look at paying more for outsourced services,” he says. “But I can’t justify one company being higher than the rest to the people I have to answer to.”

So the contractors in his area continue to witness high turnover and absentee rates, all the while trying to produce consistent services.

when asked what contractors could improve upon, Hampsey says they need to increase wages and pressure the competition to do the same, so the entire industry can benefit from higher levels of quality. His other request is to work harder at employee motivation and support.

“I find that contractors attempt to provide superior service, but they are limited by their staff problems,” he says. “They could do a world of difference if they have consistent and happier workers.”

On the other hand, one thing that Hampsey sees contractors doing well is their use of technology.

“They buy large autoscrubbers and other time-saving equipment because of their worker problems and it helps them deal with a shortage of help but still get the work done, he says.

Hampsey’s own staff doesn’t always have that luxury. “We have the staff and have to use more traditional means to do the same types of work,” he says.

A standard hard-floor cleaning project would use one or two contract workers and a high-powered machine for a total of two hours, while the in-house equivalent would take more people with less sophisticated equipment and take up to six hours.

Hampsey also is more limited to what he can handle in-house because his staff only works the day shift, while contracted employees are available around-the-clock on campus. “It’s pretty hard to justify over-time when contract workers can get stuff done much easier for us, and I don’t have to deal with the headaches of after-hours tasks.” 0




POSTED ON: 10/1/2001