How to restore and maintain office cleanliness during Covid-19

Are your employees returning to the office following the lockdown? With more people coming off furlough or breaking out of their home-working set-up in a staged return, how do you restore and maintain office cleanliness, and maintain it whilst COVID-19 is still present in the UK?

3 tips to restore and maintain office cleanliness for your staff and visitors 

1. Book a deep office clean before people return to the office

If you have a suspected case of COVID-19, then you need to immediately book a specialist decontamination service in order to disinfect your office and contain the virus. 

However, if your office has been empty or you haven’t had a suspected case of COVID-19, then you should book an office deep clean with a reputable office cleaning company to help restore office cleanliness.

An office deep clean should include:

• Full carpet and floor clean
• Vacuuming of any soft furnishings and chairs
• Cleaning and disinfection of all desks, phones and doors
• Cleaning and disinfection of office washrooms, kitchens, meeting rooms and any breakout areas as well as fridges and all appliances 
• Cleaning and disinfection of all glass partitions, lifts and stair rails

You may find that there has been a substantial build up of dust, which can also affect both health and equipment, so our office cleaning teams are trained to look at the fine details such as skirting boards and above the eyeline in the corners of the ceiling. 

2. Increase the frequency your office cleaning to daily with a reliable office cleaning company

As stated by the World Health Organisation, COVID-19 “spreads through small droplets from the nose or mouth” and “These droplets can land on objects and surfaces around the person such as tables, doorknobs and handrails.”

Whilst there is no substitute for social distancing and maintaining at least 1m or 2m (depending on the UK Government’s and/or your company’s policy) and regular hand washing – in order to maintain hygiene in your office environment, either increase or maintain the frequency of your regular office cleans to daily office cleaning.

Daily office cleaning should include cleaning and disinfection of all high-touch areas including light switches, phones, door and cupboard handles, sink taps and any appliances such as hot drink machines, phones or lifts. 

Further to the standard vacuuming of floors and spot-cleaning, we would also recommend that soft furnishings are vacuumed daily – as well as full cleans of office washrooms and kitchens. 

As your office gets busier still – you may want to consider hiring a daytime janitor for your office. Not only can they help maintain hygiene by regularly cleaning high-touch areas of the office throughout the day, they can also help maintain your COVID-19 policies such as managing hand-sanitising stations.

3. Choose a reputable office cleaning company who have clear policies, and will follow yours

This is not a time to take a risk with your suppliers. Choose a reputable, experienced office company to help restore and maintain your office cleanliness – and follow strict guidelines whilst doing so. 

NK Office Cleaning Services has been working with organisations across London for close to 40 years and are certified ISO 9001:2015, ISO 14001:2015 and ISO 45001:2015 certified for our quality management and environmental systems. We provide full COSHH documentation in accordance with Health and Safety legislation and risk assessments are carried out for each site.

The behaviour of every individual who steps into your office is of paramount importance during this global pandemic. We have retrained all our active members of staff to adhere to our COVID-19 policies and protocols – and we have also worked with our clients to understand theirs. Our policies include wearing PPE, maintaining 2m social distance, regular hand-washing and following strict operating methods to reduce the sharing of equipment and products.

Importantly, we look after our office cleaning operatives so that there is no reason they should come to work should they be displaying symptoms. We have also organised our workforce so that there should be no downtime if an office cleaning team is required to isolate for any reason.