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Switching cleaning companies without a night of missed service
Changing janitorial vendors is mostly a scheduling job. Here’s how to time the notice, take back keys and codes, and get a new crew settled in its first weeks.
Pin down what isn’t working.
Before you call a single bidder, write down what made you want to switch. Be specific: restrooms out of towels by Thursday, a different cleaner every few weeks, trash left behind in the conference room, emails that sit unanswered for days. Five concrete misses tell a new company far more than a general sense that the cleaning slipped, and they give you something to measure the first month against.
Then ask whether the trouble is the vendor or the plan. If the current agreement pays for three nights a week in a building that runs five busy days, a new company working that same scope will hit the same wall. Sometimes the fix is a new vendor with a better scope. Now and then it is simply a better scope.
Collect walkthroughs before you give notice.
Gather bids while the current crew is still working. Invite two or three companies to walk the building, and give each one the same room list, the same cleaning hours and the same list of problems. Bids built on identical information line up side by side, and whatever one of them left out stands out. The guide to writing a janitorial scope of work shows how to build that list, and what goes into a commercial cleaning quote covers how to read what comes back.
Walk the building with each bidder yourself rather than handing over a floor plan. Show them the restroom that runs out first, the kitchen that piles up by Wednesday and the entry that tracks in grit when it rains. Point out locked rooms, alarm zones and any tenant with late hours. A bidder who sees the hard spots prices them in, and you won’t meet them for the first time in the second week of service.
Ask every bidder for a written task list with frequencies, not a single line that reads nightly cleaning. That list is what the incoming crew will work from on its first night, so it should exist before you commit to anyone.
Line up the notice with the start date.
Find your current agreement and read its termination section before you choose a date. Note how much notice it asks for, whether notice has to be in writing and who should receive it. Notice periods differ from one agreement to the next, and some agreements renew automatically on a fixed date each year. If the wording is unclear, have whoever handles contracts for your company read it.
Then work backward. The smoothest switch puts the outgoing crew’s last night and the incoming crew’s first night back to back, so the building never goes a night without service. A typical order of events:
- walkthroughs and written quotes from each bidder
- a chosen company and a confirmed first night
- written notice to the current vendor, timed to that night
- a set time for returning keys, cards and codes
- a walkthrough with the new supervisor in week one
Steer the first night away from the week of a board meeting, a move or the holiday shutdown. A calm stretch lets the incoming crew learn your floors without an event deadline on top.
Take back every key, card and code.
Make an inventory of everything the outgoing company holds: building and suite keys, closet keys, access cards or fobs, parking passes and alarm codes. Arrange for all of it to come back on the last night or the morning after, and check each item against your list rather than accepting a bag of keys on trust.
Deactivate the old company’s cards that same day. Delete its alarm user codes and issue fresh ones to the incoming company, so the alarm log shows exactly who entered and when. If a key never comes back, rekey the lock it opens. An unaccounted-for key to your building is a bigger problem than a locksmith visit.
Look inside the janitor’s closet as well. Vacuums and machines the old vendor owns leave with that vendor. Settle who owns the paper, soap and liners on the shelf before the last night, so the closet isn’t an open question when the new crew arrives.
Write down what the old crew knew.
A crew that has cleaned your building for a while carries knowledge nobody ever wrote down: the door that sticks, the alarm zone that trips through the side entrance, the tenant who works until nine, the recycling that goes to a separate enclosure. Ask your own staff and the outgoing supervisor what the crew did that the scope never mentioned.
Then pick which of those habits to keep and add them to the written task list. Watering lobby plants or running the breakroom dishwasher can be part of the plan, but only if it is on paper. Anything that lived as an unspoken favor tends to vanish with the change.
Put building facts on the same sheet: where the light switches for each floor are, which entrance the crew should use after hours, where full trash and recycling bags go, and who to call if the alarm sounds. A one-page building sheet taped inside the janitor’s closet answers most first-night questions before anyone has to phone you.
Steady the new crew through its first weeks.
Treat the first month as a settling-in period, with a walk-through alongside the new supervisor after the first few nights. Our guide to the first weeks with a new cleaning company covers what to check week by week.
File the paperwork from the change with the new agreement: a copy of the notice you sent, the date each key and card came back and the names on the new alarm codes. When Fieldstone takes over a building, the work runs from a written plan and supervisors make quality inspections against it, so a miss gets corrected rather than repeated.
Tell your people what changed. A short note to staff or tenants with the start date, the new cleaning hours and a contact for problems saves a week of confused emails.
Planning a switch?
If your current agreement is coming up for renewal, we’ll walk your building, put the plan and quote in writing and set the first night to line up with your notice. Request a quote to book the walkthrough.
A few useful answers
Common questions.
How far ahead should we start planning a switch?
Start a few weeks before you need to give notice. Walkthroughs and written quotes usually take one to two weeks to collect, and the notice period runs after that, so a month or more of lead time keeps the change from feeling rushed.
Should we tell our current cleaning company we're collecting bids?
That’s your call. Many managers wait until they have picked a new company and confirmed a first night, then give notice in writing. Either way, let the current service run normally until its last night.
Can we reuse our old scope of work?
Use it as a starting point, then walk the building with it in hand. Older scopes tend to miss rooms that changed use, newly added suites and tasks the crew picked up informally. Updating it before bids go out keeps every bidder pricing the same building.
Can we get your certificate of insurance before the first night?
Yes. Fieldstone is insured, carries workers’ compensation and hands a certificate of insurance to each client, so yours can sit in the vendor file before the start date.
What if the outgoing vendor doesn't return every key?
Rekey the locks those keys open and switch off any access cards that didn’t come back. Then update your key log so it shows who holds what from the new crew’s first night onward.