Resources
Comparing cleaning proposals: a checklist that puts every bid through the same questions
Bids for the same Tracy building can look nothing alike. Print this checklist, give each bid its own copy, and see which ones answer the questions that matter.
Printable checklist
Why bids are hard to compare
Ask three companies to price the same warehouse office and the answers come back in three formats: a room grid, a cadence table, a short letter. Each makes sense alone. Side by side they don’t line up, and the thing you most need to see, what’s missing, is the hardest to spot.
The sheet below turns that mess into one repeatable test. Give each bid its own copy, put the company’s name in the top field, and go down the lines with the bid open next to you. Tick what’s answered and circle what isn’t. Groundwork such as the room list, the site walk and what to ask on it lives in our Tracy hiring guide.
Fill in a sheet as each bid lands rather than all at once at the end. The details are fresher, and your follow-up questions go out sooner.
Tasks and cadence
The task list is where proposals differ most, and where the differences hide best. Check that each one names your areas rather than a generic list, and that every task carries a cadence. A bid listing twenty tasks with no cadence says less than one listing twelve with a day beside each.
- Every area from your room list appears, back rooms, locker areas and the dispatch office included
- Each task shows when it runs: each visit, weekly, monthly or periodic
- Restrooms and breakrooms get their own lines instead of one catch-all entry
- Periodic floor work such as carpet extraction, scrubbing, and strip and wax is listed with its cycle
- Warehouse floors and staff rooms form their own zone where the building has them
- Anything missing goes on a list of follow-up questions
Watch for cadence words that mean different things to different readers. Regularly and as needed don’t tell you when the baseboards get wiped. Weekly, on Tuesday nights, does.
Already drafted your own task sheet? Hold every bid up to it, line against line. Our zone-by-zone scope guide walks through drafting that sheet.
Hours, access and porter time
- Visit days and the window the crew works
- Service after hours, early morning or during the day
- Porter hours, if any, and the rooms they cover
- How keys, alarm codes and badges are issued and tracked
- Rooms that stay locked or off the route
- What happens on holidays and planned closures
Timing decides whether a plan works in a multi-shift building. A bid that cleans the breakroom an hour before second shift takes its break looks fine on paper and fails by morning. If daytime coverage is part of the decision, our comparison of day porters and nightly janitorial helps frame the question.
Ask as well how the crew gets through a guarded gate or a badge reader, and which of your people answers the phone when an alarm code fails at night. Those details sound small until the first night they come up.
Supplies and equipment
Supplies are the line proposals leave vaguest. Pin it down so every bid covers the same thing.
- Who buys paper towels, toilet tissue, hand soap and liners
- Dispensers: theirs installed, or yours left in place
- Who brings the cleaning products and machines
- Storage space the crew needs for carts and stock
- How dispensers get refilled between visits
Some buildings buy their own paper and want the crew to restock it. Others want supplies folded into the service, as our janitorial supplies option does. Either choice works, as long as every bid is answering the same one. Note your choice at the top of every sheet.
Oversight and communication
- How the work gets checked, and how often
- Whether inspection results come back to you
- Who you call with everyday requests
- The route for flagging a miss, and how fast it gets fixed
- How changes to the plan are requested and confirmed in writing
This section shows how a company runs after the first month. With us, supervisors check each client’s plan on regular quality inspections. Whatever a bid says on this point, ask how the results reach you and who answers when something slips.
Communication also covers the small requests: an extra pass before a visitor tour, a coffee spill on the carpet, a room added after a reshuffle. A bid that says how those are handled saves a round of emails later.
Insurance and screening
- A certificate of insurance in your file before night one
- Workers’ compensation named
- Bond in place
- Screening: everyone on the crew background-checked
- Coverage matches what your property or landlord asks vendors to carry
On our end, insurance, a bond and workers’ compensation are all in place, clients each receive a certificate of insurance for their files, and each crew member clears a background check first. Request the same documents from every company you are considering, so the vendor file is full before keys change hands. Gathering them up front beats chasing them after the first week.
The start-up plan, and reading the stack
- Proposed start date and first visit
- Walkthrough before service begins
- Handover of keys and alarm codes
- What the first week looks like
- When the first review of the work takes place
A start-up plan shows whether a company has thought past the signature. If another company is on the job now, our changeover guide covers notice and handover.
Once the stack is complete, compare one section at a time across every sheet. Blank lines come first, vague ones second. The bid that answers in specifics and fits your hours and your hardest-working rooms was written for your building. Request a walkthrough on our contact page to put ours on the table.
A few useful answers
Common questions.
Can I print the bid checklist at no charge?
Yes. It downloads without a form. Run off a copy per bid and clip the set together.
A bid skipped several lines. Now what?
Send the company the open lines and ask for written answers before you choose. Most gaps close with a single email.
Why give each bid a separate copy?
So every bid gets the full set of lines and its own space for notes. Spread the finished copies out when it is time to choose.
Does the sheet help with only one bid in hand?
Yes. Run that bid through every line anyway. The blank lines become your questions before you agree to a start date.
Will you go through the checklist for your own bid?
Yes. Bring the sheet to our walkthrough and we answer each line for our bid, from the task list and visit times to the certificate of insurance.