We have picked up a lot of commercial contracts from the company that had them before us, and the story is almost always identical. The first two months were fine. Then the visits got shorter, the same three things started getting missed, nobody could point at a document saying they should not be, and by the time anyone complained it had been going on for half a year.
That is not usually dishonesty. It is what happens when a contract is priced before the scope is written. If nobody has agreed what a visit includes, then a visit includes whatever fits in the time — and the time quietly shrinks to whatever the price supports. Here is what to ask so that cannot happen.
First: can I see the scope as a task list, by area, with a frequency against each line? This is the whole ballgame. "Clean the office weekly" is not a scope. "Desks wiped weekly, internal glass weekly, skirting monthly, high dusting quarterly, fridge interior monthly" is. If a company will not put that in writing before you sign, the reason is that they want the flexibility to do less later.
Second: how long is a visit, and how many people? Multiply the two and you have the labour hours you are buying. It is the only number that lets you compare two quotes honestly. A cheaper quote with fewer hours is not cheaper, it is less — and cleaning is almost entirely labour, so hours are the product.
Third: is it the same crew each time? A rotating roster means nobody ever learns the building — which door sticks, which room the alarm sensor is in, that the meeting room gets used at 8am so it has to be done first. Consistency is not a luxury in commercial cleaning; it is the difference between a scope that gets followed and one that gets guessed at.
Fourth: what happens about consumables? Hand soap, paper towels, bin liners and toilet roll are a recurring cost, and whether they are included, billed separately, or your responsibility should be written down. It is a small thing that causes a disproportionate number of arguments.
Fifth: are you insured, and can I see the certificate? Not a yes-or-no question — an ask-to-see-it question. Anyone genuinely insured will send it over without hesitating. In a commercial building where your cleaner has keys and alarm codes, this is not a formality.
Sixth: how do I raise a problem, and what happens then? There should be a named person and a stated response. Our own answer is that anything reported before noon gets addressed on the next scheduled visit, and anything serious gets someone out the same week — but the specific promise matters less than whether there is one at all.
Seventh: what is not included? A company that answers this question directly is telling you they have thought about the scope. Window exteriors above ground floor, carpet extraction, floor stripping and sealing, and post-construction cleaning are all specialist jobs that usually sit outside a general contract, and you want to know that before you need one, not after.
One more thing, which is less a question than a warning. Be wary of a quote that arrives without a site visit. An office cannot be priced accurately from a floor area, because the things that drive the hours are not in the floor area: how many restrooms, how much glass, whether there is a kitchen, how many desks, whether the floors are carpet or hard, and how tidy the place is at the end of a working day. Anyone quoting without looking is either guessing high or planning to revise.
Looking for office or building cleaning around Louisville? Call Workforce Industries at (407) 748-9875. We will come after your hours, walk the space, and send a written scope with a frequency against every line — so you can compare us against anyone else on the same terms.