Office Cleaning Best Practices for a Healthier Workplace

On this page

A spotless office makes a good first impression, and that is the least of what cleaning does. The Environmental Protection Agency says Americans spend about 90 percent of their time indoors, where the concentrations of some pollutants are often two to five times higher than typical outdoor concentrations (EPA). For people who work in an office, a large part of that time is spent there. What is on its surfaces and in its air is what they live with all day.

We have cleaned offices in the Valley of the Sun since 1988. The practices below are the ones we would want in any office, whoever cleans it. Where a health claim is made, the source is named.

Start with what hands touch

In its guidance for community buildings such as offices, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention puts it simply: cleaning alone removes most types of harmful germs from surfaces, and high-touch surfaces should be cleaned regularly (CDC). Its examples include pens, counters, door handles, elevator buttons and desks. In an office the list is longer than people expect:

• Door handles and push plates, including the restroom door on the way out.
• Light switches and elevator buttons.
• The copier panel, the shared keyboard at the front desk and the conference room phone.
• The refrigerator handle, the microwave buttons, the coffee pot and the faucet in the break room.
• Chair arms in the waiting area and the edge of the reception counter.
• The pens at the sign-in sheet.

A cleaning scope that says only ‘dust and wipe surfaces’ leaves all of that to chance. Name the high-touch points in writing and they get done.

Clean first, and disinfect when there is a reason

Cleaning and disinfecting are different jobs. Cleaning takes soil and most germs off a surface. Disinfecting can kill harmful germs that remain afterward, and the CDC advises doing it in the areas of a facility where people have obviously been ill. The order matters. The same guidance says to clean surfaces before sanitizing or disinfecting them, because impurities like dirt may make it harder for the chemicals to kill germs.

Time matters as well. The CDC’s instruction is to read the product label and to keep the surface wet for the entire contact time given in the product’s directions. A quick spray and an immediate wipe does not give the product that time.

Work from high to low and from clean to dirty

The CDC’s environmental cleaning procedures, written for health care facilities with limited resources, set out an order of work that we think holds in any building: proceed from cleaner areas to dirtier ones, proceed from high to low so that dirt does not fall onto something already cleaned, and proceed in a systematic manner so that nothing is missed (CDC). In an office that means desks and meeting rooms before the break room, the break room before the restrooms, ledges before floors, and the floor last.

Take the dust out of the building

The EPA notes that people bring soils and dusts indoors on their shoes and clothing. In the Valley there is plenty to bring, and the monsoon’s dust storms add to it. Three things help decide whether that dust leaves the building or only moves around inside it.

• The vacuum’s filter. The EPA describes a HEPA filter as one that can theoretically remove at least 99.97 percent of dust, pollen, mold, bacteria and other airborne particles 0.3 microns in size (EPA). We use HEPA vacuums.
• The cloth. Dust should be picked up, not pushed along a shelf. We dust with microfiber cloths.
• How often. The Carpet and Rug Institute advises vacuuming carpet daily in high-traffic areas, twice a week in medium-traffic areas and weekly in light-traffic areas (CRI). An entrance and a corner office are not on the same schedule.

Five habits for the staff between visits

No cleaning service is in the building all day. These five habits cost nothing and make every visit count for more.

1. Wash hands, and keep the soap stocked. The CDC reports that handwashing education in the community reduces respiratory illnesses such as colds in the general population by 16 to 21 percent (CDC). That only works at a sink with soap and towels, so tell whoever refills the dispensers the moment one runs out.
2. Clear the desk before you leave. A cleaner can wipe a clear surface. Nobody should be moving your papers to reach it.
3. Take food waste out daily. A bin with lunch in it should not sit overnight in a small office or over a weekend anywhere.
4. Report spills at once. A wet floor is a slip waiting to happen. OSHA’s rule is that workroom floors are kept clean and, to the extent feasible, dry (OSHA 1910.22).
5. Say when someone has been ill. Tell your cleaning service which desk or room it was, so that area can be disinfected and not only cleaned.

Match the schedule to the building

An office with a public counter, a clinic’s waiting room and a sales floor are touched by strangers all day and usually need cleaning every working day. A small professional office with few visitors can often run on a weekly visit. Many churches are quiet for six days and full on the seventh, so their cleaning is timed for Sunday morning. We offer daily, weekly and monthly plans. The right frequency is a fact about the building, not about the cleaning company.

If you would like these practices applied to your own office, our commercial cleaning page explains what each of our services consists of and how an arrangement starts.

Questions people ask