Category: disinfection service

While COVID-19 has locked many of us in our homes and forced companies to adopt remote working measures, there are some businesses that cannot function effectively without access to their main office. If your company uses proprietary systems or enforces security measures that are not compatible with a work-from-home approach, then you have no choice but to come into the office and work as per usual.

While this can be concerning for you and your employees, following proper safety guidelines and adopting hygienic practices will greatly reduce the chances of COVID-19 spreading through your office. Contrary to the panic that the media has incited in the country’s workforce, it’s possible to drastically lower the chances of contracting the virus from your office if you take the right steps to clean your workplace and use established preventative measures.

One of the most common strategies to help maintain regular office productivity is to disinfect your office either with a reputable cleaning service or with your own supplies and tools. Regardless of your approach, an organized cleaning routine and effective hygiene practices are essential for a number of different reasons. It helps to curb the potential spread of COVID-19, it gives your employees peace of mind and it also keeps your business running.

Basic cleaning guidance from the CDC

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has published a set of effective hygiene guidelines that cover the cleaning and disinfection of workplaces . These routines can eliminate the presence of COVID-19 on surfaces and objects in your office and will provide your staff with peace of mind to continue working and being productive.

Here’s what you should know from these detailed guidelines:

• Identify surfaces and objects that are touched on a regular basis. This includes tables, switches, keypads and sinks. These should be high-priority targets for regular disinfection and guidelines should be pinned to remind staff.
• Any shared devices, such as keyboards, electronic equipment and proprietary hardware should also be disinfected on a regular basis.
• When cleaning, use disposable gloves, a gown and a mask. When finished, carefully remove these items and dispose of them in the trash.
• Clean surfaces and objects before disinfecting them. A simple solution of soap and water can remove particles that contain the COVID-19 virus. This will greatly reduce the presence of the virus before attempting to disinfect the surface or object.
• Check the EPA list of disinfectants for use against COVID-19 to ensure you are using the right product to disinfect surfaces. Keep the contact time and disinfection directions in mind before using the product. If you do not have access to these solutions, then a mix of 5 tablespoons of bleach per gallon of water is an effective alternative. For spray bottle applications, 4 teaspoons of bleach should be used for a quart of water.
• Do not attempt to mix cleaning products to create a stronger solution.

Giving you and your employees peace of mind

The main hurdle to overcome during the pandemic is finding a way to offer peace of mind to you and your employees. If your staff are unable to work from home due to the nature of your business and its processes, then commuting to the office can be a daunting prospect. Even if the chances of contracting COVID-19 at the office are slim due to your cleaning processes, there’s still a chance that you and your staff may be infected during the commute.

Establishing clear guidelines, tracking staff members and suggesting safer commuting options can help diminish these fears and prevent the spread of COVID-19. Here are some options to consider:

1. Work with your staff to establish a formal set of guidelines that must be followed by everyone in the company. This can include pinning hygiene reminders in the toilet, placing hand sanitizer bottles at the entrance to your office and encouraging staff to report early symptoms.
2. If possible, spread the position of staff members around the office to comply with social distancing guidelines.
3. Ensure you keep track of staff members as they enter and exit your office to help trace the potential spread of COVID-19 in the event someone reports symptoms or tests positive for the virus.
4. Providing face masks and travel bottles of hand sanitizer can help give employees peace of mind when commuting or working.
5. Request staff to avoid public transport where possible can curb the potential spread of COVID-19.
6. Suggest alternate methods such as cycling, walking or driving
7. Remind staff to sanitize their hands before entering the main office building and to clean surfaces they have touched before leaving the workplace
8. Remember that the pandemic can also cause a lot of distress and frustration in your employees. Understand that mental wellbeing during COVID-19 can be a sensitive topic that must be taken seriously to protect your employees.

While the pandemic has become a major concern for businesses of all sizes, perhaps the most affected group are smaller companies and retail stores that cannot afford to work from home to maintain business operations. Analysts have predicted more than 15,000 store closures by retailers as a result of COVID-19, and this is on top of the millions of Americans that are filing jobless claims which brings the total to 22 million citizens losing their jobs.

So to answer the title of this article; yes, you should disinfect your office as soon as possible. In order to keep the economy going, we have to start taking active measures to keep our businesses running. For offices, that means thorough disinfection and adopting hygienic practices to help protect workers and prevent the spread of COVID-19. We hope that this article has proven useful for business owners that are looking to resume operations and open up their offices after an extended period of downtime.

As a business, keeping your premises clean has always been a priority. Your team needs somewhere hygenic to work, and the items you use around your company will slowly stop working if they aren’t cleaned properly.

While this has always been important, though, the recent worldwide outbreak of Covid-19 has made a lot of companies stop to think about the work they do to keep their buildings in the right condition. Without the right work, it will be easy for a workplace like this to become a hotspot for disease, and now is as good a time as any to start moving in the right direction.

We’ve delved into every aspect of commercial disinfection for this article, breaking down each of the jobs you have to do and providing some context to the suggestions being offered by governments. Your office, warehouse, or store may not seem dirty, but the biggest threats to the health of your team are often invisible.

Check out this infographic from scgroup.global 

Routine Cleaning

Routine cleaning has always been one of the best practices to ensure that a place is hygenic. There are several different levels to this, and the most important cleaning will need to be done on a very regular basis. We’ve broken down the different jobs you have to do and placed them into categories based on how often you have to carry them out. Of course, it doesn’t hurt to clean things more than this.

Hourly Cleaning

The idea of cleaning on an hourly basis can seem a little dramatic to a lot of business owners. In reality, though, there will be a lot of tools and environments being shared within your company, and these need to be kept as clean as possible to avoid an outbreak.

For example, if you own a shop, it’s likely that you will take payments with card machines. Most people use bank cards instead of cash nowadays, and this means that these devices will see an awful lot of use. They should be disinfected as often as possible, ensuring that the chances of viruses and other microbes being spread is as low as it can be.

It’s best to make this sort of cleaning as convenient as possible, and modern disinfectant wipes are one of the best tools for this.

Daily Cleaning

Alongside hourly cleaning, there is also plenty of daily cleaning work to be done. Viruses like Covid-19 can linger on surfaces for several days if they aren’t dealt with, and this makes desks, keyboards, and the other tools which are shared between your team very risky.

Your daily cleaning should cover areas like this, along with things like vacuuming your floors and dusting surfaces. For example, if you were running a warehouse, it would make sense to clean the steering wheels and other controls on the forklifts your employees use each day. Even things like light switches and door handles should be covered with this type of cleaning.

There are countless products on the market which can make this easier for you. Sprays are convenient as they can be used with a variety of tools, but wipes and mixable solutions can also be good for businesses of all sizes.

Weekly Cleaning

The cleaning work you save to handle on a weekly basis should have nothing to do with disinfection. A week is plenty of time for a virus or other disease to take hold in your business, and this means that you should only leave things for this long if they aren’t a risk to people’s health. This can include a range of different cleaning jobs, like emptying waste bins and tidying people’s desks.

The Right Products

Cleaning products come in a lot of different shapes and sizes, giving you loads of choice when it comes to picking the ones which your company will use. There are several factors to consider when you’re choosing products like this, and we’ve outlined both these and the different options you have below.

What kind of products should I use?

It’s hard to know what to look for in cleaning products when you haven’t spent much time researching this space before. We’ve identified some of the most important features of these products and broken them down to give you an idea of what you should be hunting for.

• Potency: There wouldn’t be much point in spending money on cleaning products if they’re not going to be strong enough to do their job. Most companies claim that their disinfectants kill 99.9% of bacteria and viruses, though this doesn’t mean that they are all just as strong. Our spray systems, for example, are far more potent than the products you can buy from a store’s shelves.
• Convenience & Ease: Cleaning isn’t a one-time thing, and it makes sense to make the job as easy as possible to ensure that your team keeps on top of it. Our spray disinfectant service takes all of the work out of your hands, making it easier than just about any other option on the market. 
• Safety: While you want the chemicals you use to be able to kill bacteria and viruses, you don’t want it to cause harm to your team or customers. Safety is very important, and this is why we’ve developed a spray system which doesn’t even need to be wiped down; it’s always safe.

The Products

You can use a huge range of different products to keep your business clean, and there are loads of options on the market for businesses looking to make sure that their offices are in good shape. The types of products you use can have a dramatic impact on your ability to stay on top of work like this.

• Wipes, Sprays, & Other Off The Shelf Products: Superstores and other convenience shops will always have a wide range of cleaning supplies on offer. These are usually intended for home use, though, and can lack the potency you require for an environment with so many people.
• Industrial Solutions: Many businesses don’t buy their cleaning products in single bottles. Instead, if you choose the right manufacturer, you will be able to buy your cleaning solutions in far greater quantities. Many of the disinfectants which come like this can be used in a variety of different ways, from inside spray bottles to on sponges and cloths. This makes them very useful to companies with a range of cleaning needs.
• Cleaning Services: While they aren’t specifically products, cleaning services can also be very useful to a business like yours. Our dedicated team of cleaners has helped a range of different businesses to make their workplaces safe during the Covid-19 outbreak. This ensures that you are using the best cleaning products to keep your business hygienic.

The Right Training

Employee training can play a large role in keeping everyone safe on your premises. Many companies assume that this only applies to general safety, but it also impacts health, and you need to make sure that your team is trained correctly.

For example, it makes sense to have people wipe over their desks with disinfectant at the start and end of each day. This simple trick can save people from being exposed to viruses and other microbes for long periods, and it doesn’t have to take any time or effort. Alongside this, it can also be worth spending some time teaching your team about the different risk factors they are exposed to.

Most companies don’t want their team to have to clean the whole building each day. While they shouldn’t have to bend over backwards to keep their workspace clean, though, they do have a responsibility to act when there is a risk that people could be infected. Providing gloves, face masks, and other protective equipment can be a good way to ensure that your team has everything they need to do this properly.

How Can We Help?

There are going to be a lot of businesses working to improve the cleanliness of their offices in the coming months and years. This isn’t something you have to handle on your own, though.

Here at Schuelke Plumbing, we have a wealth of experience when it comes to disinfecting commercial properties. Our potent solution is 100% plant-based and works almost immediately without posing any threat to your team.

We encourage any business which is concerned about the future of their internal hygiene to get in contact with our dedicated team. We strive to make our service as convenient as possible, and can have your workplace disinfected when your team is away.

The future of commercial hygiene is sure to be shaken by the recent outbreak. Companies across the world are going to be looking for ways to keep themselves cleaner, and this is something which you have to keep in mind when you have a team working for you. Working from home serves as a temporary solution, but many companies will struggle with this in the long-run, and you need to be able to keep your business from being at the heart of a new outbreak.