Cleaning the Hostel

We though about outsourse cleaning and outsource laundry, but in the end they proved to be much more expensive, than hiring our own cleaning staff. We have 16 ensiute rooms (78 beds), common room, laundry, patio, reception, commun kitchen with dining room. Don't forget also, that you need to clean stairs, storage rooms, etc.

So at the moment we have two cleaning ladies, they work in shifts full time (40 hours week): 8 hours per day from 10 to 18 and 3 hours per day from 11 to 14 (between check-in and check-out). Of course, they have weekends, so some days there are no second cleaning lady between 11 and 14.

The shedule is the following: 1) 1 hour - the kitchen, dining room and reception 2) 3 hours room cleaning, 3) 1,5-2 hours laundry, 4) 2-2,5 hours for the rest.

The cleaning ladies do not clean storage rooms and patio. We have full-time maitenance person, who does this. Sometimes he helps with stairs and window cleaning.

Reception staff voluntary helps with the kitchen during the day (rinse dishes, put dishes in dishwasher, etc). 

Of course we, owners, are also there to help if needed. For me no problem to help with cleaning, laundry, reception or whatever if needed (but normally there is no need).

Time-saving tips for cleaning:

- High quality cleaning products and good cleaning equipment help to the cleaning staff do their work faster. 

- Minimal design of the rooms (less cleaning).

- Good quality bed-linen that almost doesn't need ironing.

- Separate laundry (i.e. washing machine and dryer for staff use only).

- Optimal distribution of the clients in the rooms.

- Well organized and daily updated cleaning to-do list for the rooms.

Do you have to have special insurance to train your own cleaners?

We hired experienced staff (who worked in other hostels/hotels). So they know how to do their work efficiently. Of course, we have written instructions (how to clean, how to use cleaning products, safety sheets, etc.) and also all staff have to pass risks prevention training twice per year (included in our insurance plan).

Who substitutes when a cleaner is sick or needs a vacation if you only have two full time staff?

We have contacts of several cleaning ladies, who live in our neighborhood, so they help us in such cases.

Would you be willing to share more information about the role of your maintenance person? I was thinking that we may only need to outsource a part time worker, but you are saying that you pay someone for 40 hours a week?

At the begining we paid to outsource workers. But outsource workers sometimes, when you need them the most, are not avaliable, because they have other clients, and also their services are quite expensive. So we hired a part-time worker for 20 hours per week. He worked from 11 to 15 (to be able to check/fix things right after check-out). It wasn't enough, and we decided to extend his contract to 30 hours per week. But expences in this case are almost the same as for 40 hours contract, so we asked him if he was agree to do some cleaning tasks, so now he works full-time.

Standart maintaince tasks:

- Routine inspections to identify problems

- Update maintenance to-do list / maintainance shedule

- Fix identified problems 

- Supplies control (list/search/buy).

- Keep storage rooms organized.

- Some cleaning tasks (stairs, windows, patio, some common areas).

As we have our own building, so in addition to standard maintenance tasks there are some others:

- Every day check parameters of water heating, air-conditioning and other systems and if they are functioning properly (if not, call to certified technicians). 

- Basic physical-chemical analysis of water (temperature, chlorine, etc). It is mandatory for us to keep daily log of these parameters and each month send this information to sanitary department of the municipality. 

- Keep all technical certificates up to date, if not, require inspection from certified technicians.

Have either of you ever considered housing your perminant staff in their own quarters? The idea here would be to reduce pay and ensure the likleyhood of long term staff.

It is not legal here in Barcelona.

1) We can't count housing in the hostel as part of staff's payment and thus reduce their salary,  local laws and labor agreement don't permit us do so. 

2) We can't provide long-term accomondation, because local laws and regulations permit only short-term accommodation in hostels.

3) We have to report daily to the local police information about all people who are living/acommodated in the hostel (with ID/passport data). If police or municipality come with unexpected inspection, non-registered guests will result in heavy fines and big problems for us. So obviously we can't and we won't accommodate anybody longer, when it's permitted by law.

Plus, cleaning and maintance staff they are not in the age, when such exchange (housing as a part of salary) may be of interest to them. They are already settled and have families. Receptionists, as they are all young, probably could be interested.