The legal duty
The starting point is regulation 9 of the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992. It says every workplace, and the furniture, furnishings and fittings in it, shall be kept sufficiently clean. Floors, walls and ceilings must be capable of being kept clean. Waste must not be allowed to accumulate except in suitable receptacles.
The Health and Safety Executive publishes the Approved Code of Practice for these regulations as document L24. It expects a cleaning regime that is appropriate to the activities carried out in the building. The law does not tell you how many times a week to vacuum. It tells you the outcome, and leaves the method to the employer. The specification is where you turn that duty into tasks, frequencies and evidence.
Two other duties sit alongside it. The Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 require an assessment for every cleaning chemical used on your premises, with safety data sheets available and products stored and labelled correctly. The waste duty of care under section 34 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 means that any waste leaving your building, including sanitary and washroom waste, goes only to a registered carrier with a written transfer note, and those notes are kept for two years.
What a specification contains
A working specification has six parts.
Scope by area. List every space the contract covers, room by room or zone by zone. Reception and lobby, open-plan floors, private offices, meeting rooms, kitchens and tea points, washrooms, stairwells, lifts, plant and post rooms, external entrances. Anything left off the list will not be cleaned and will not be priced.
Task and frequency table. For each area, name the task and how many times per week or per year it happens. The British Institute of Cleaning Science publishes a standard specification table that many councils and corporate occupiers use as a base. Its office pattern gives waste removal five times a week, spot vacuuming of carpets four times and a full vacuum once, dust mopping or spot mopping of hard floors four times with a full mop once, spot cleaning of doors and vertical surfaces five times, and dusting and damp wiping of furniture four times with a polish once. Washrooms are usually daily throughout. Your building may need more or less. What matters is that the number is written down.
Periodic tasks. These are the jobs a daily team cannot do in a normal visit. Carpet extraction, hard floor machine scrub or strip and reseal, high-level dusting of ledges and vents, internal glass partitions, upholstery, blind and light diffuser cleaning, fridge and dishwasher deep cleans. Give each a frequency, typically monthly, quarterly, six-monthly or annual, and say whether they are inside the contract price or quoted separately.
Standards and method. State the result you expect, not just the action. A hard floor is clean when it is dry, free of debris, stains and scuffs, with a uniform appearance. Colour coding of cloths and mops between washrooms, kitchens and general areas should be a requirement, not an option. Name any framework you want followed, such as BICSc methods.
Consumables and equipment. Say who supplies cleaning materials and machinery, and who supplies washroom consumables such as paper, soap and sanitary bins. Cleaning materials are almost always the contractor's. Washroom consumables vary by contract and the difference can move the price by a wide margin.
Access, security and people. Working hours, keyholding, alarm codes, escort rules for secure areas, vetting requirements, insurance limits, and whether the same operatives attend every visit. Ask for the same operatives every visit and a named deputy for absence.
Daily, weekly and periodic in practice
A typical daily visit in an occupied office covers waste and recycling from every bin, kitchens and tea points cleared and wiped with the sink and worktops sanitised, washrooms cleaned, sanitised and restocked, touch points such as door handles, push plates, light switches and lift buttons wiped, spot vacuuming of traffic lanes and entrances, spot mopping of spills, and a check of reception glass and the front door.
Weekly tasks fill in around that. A full vacuum edge to edge including under desks, a full mop of hard floors, dusting of desks and horizontal surfaces where the desk policy allows, wiping of chairs and meeting tables, internal glass at eye level, skirtings and ledges, and a wipe of bins inside and out.
Periodic tasks sit on a calendar the supervisor owns. Carpet extraction in reception and corridors is often quarterly and elsewhere annual. Hard floors in a lobby may need a monthly machine scrub and a strip and reseal once or twice a year. High-level dusting, light fittings, vents and blinds are usually quarterly or six-monthly.
Day or night
Out-of-hours cleaning gives the team full access, so the work is faster and noisy tasks such as vacuuming and floor machines do not disturb anyone. It needs keyholding, alarm handling and supervision of staff nobody from your side will see. Daytime cleaning is visible, uses lighting and heating already running, and keeps washrooms and kitchens presentable through the day. It takes longer because the team is working around people, and it rules out floor machines, extraction and anything that leaves a wet floor. Many London offices run a split. A short daytime presence for washrooms, kitchens and spills, with the main clean after hours.
How to compare quotes
Send every bidder the same specification and insist they price it as written. Then compare four things.
Hours. Ask for the weekly labour hours behind the price. Two quotes for the same specification with very different hours are not the same service. The cheaper one has decided in advance which tasks will be skipped.
Supervision. Ask how often a supervisor inspects, whether inspections are recorded, and how you see the results. Daily spot checks, a weekly zone audit and a monthly full inspection with a score is a reasonable pattern for a multi-floor office.
Inclusions. Confirm which periodic tasks and which consumables are inside the price. A quote that excludes carpet extraction and washroom paper can look cheaper by a wide margin and cost more by the end of the year.
Remedy. Ask what happens when a task is missed. A good contract names a response time for a re-clean, a log of the issue, and a review meeting if the same problem repeats.
What a compliant service looks like
Commercial Cleaning London takes on office cleaning across London on these terms. The specification is agreed with you area by area and task by task before the price is set, with frequencies you can hold us to. The contract commits us to the same team at each visit, with named cover for absence, so the building is learned once. A supervisor inspects against the specification and records the result, and the record is yours to see. Chemicals arrive with COSHH assessments and data sheets. Waste is removed through a registered waste carrier, with transfer notes kept. A missed task is corrected on the next visit under the specification and logged.