If one of your pending tasks is hiring a janitorial service, you will need a quick lesson on making the right choice. There is a huge diversity of cleaning services. Some do residential. Some do commercial. Some do industrial, and some do specialty jobs like medical offices and restaurants. One of the other factors is that some are small services with a few accounts and others are large services with hundreds of accounts. It is not as easy as picking up the Yellow pages and selecting an attractive ad.
As you might imagine, there is good and bad about both of these types of services. The small janitorial firms tend to be less expensive and frankly need your business more than the larger firms. Larger firms have a track record and are less likely to go out of business due to economic hazards. Smaller firms can deliver quality of service like the larger firms, but larger firms have greater resources in equipment and manpower. Larger firms use more advanced equipment to cover the job quicker which makes them price competitive.
Let’s be honest. It costs more to run a large janitorial firm. There is a need to hire more staff, sales people, and managers to keep the operation functioning well. Large firms may have move the 50-100 accounts. They must operate well on many levels to handle the businesses they service happy. Beware of large companies who promise the world to get your business then do poor work afterwards. These companies bid low because they do not intend to give you quality service, but to ride out the contract with as little expense possible. Conversely, small companies may be ill-prepared to handle the needs of your company, and you get the flack.
Conversely, the small company struggles to provide a level of service compared to the bigger operations. They may not have the depth of manpower, training, and equipment that you will find in the large services. If the key people are ill or out of commission, the business is directly impacted. As you can see, it is often a trade off between pricing and support. The company that can span both issues will be the winner.
Here’s the point, most companies are not looking for cut rate janitorial service. They generally want the best cleaning service for the money. The RFP is a formal outline of the work duties, requirements, and stipulations. Whereas a quote asks for the service to make a bid based on standard cleaning processes. It still comes down to a consideration of who makes the lowest bid. This invites the wrong people to find a way to under-bid the competition though they know that they cannot provide the quality expected at these discounted rates.
It’s time to change the process. Although price will always be a part of the consideration, it is important that you discover the quality and reliability of the cleaning service that you hire. To help you understand this better, I have prepared a ten page report called “How to Hire a Janitorial Service.” It includes a sample RFP and offers some needful advice on a subject that few people really understand. You’ll find this report at www.GreenJanitor.net.
There is another issue that must be including in any janitorial choice. States and cities are now pressuring area companies to “Go Green.” This start, quite frankly, with your janitorial service. In conjunction with your other considerations, you must insist on a janitorial service that does more than mouth service for Green services. In the report found at www.greenjanitor.net, I include an important section on how to determine if your janitorial service is really Green, or a Green pretender. Believe me, the pressure for companies to Go Green is going to be a huge issue, and your cleaning service is an important key to the solution.
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