Cleaning vs. Disinfecting: What Actually Cuts Down Sick Days in an Office

Every November it goes the same way. One person in accounting starts coughing, and two weeks later half the floor is out. Around then we usually get a call from an office manager asking if we can do a disinfecting round. It's a reasonable ask. But it helps to know what you're actually asking for, because cleaning, sanitizing, and disinfecting are three different things, and most offices are only getting the first one.

Three words that don't mean the same thing — Cleaning removes dirt, grease, and grime. You use detergent, a cloth, and some effort. It doesn't kill much, but it lifts a lot of germs off the surface along with the dirt. Sanitizing knocks the number of germs down to a level that's considered safe, and you see it mostly in food prep areas. Disinfecting kills germs on a surface using a product registered for that purpose. In Canada, those products carry a DIN (Drug Identification Number) from Health Canada, and you'll find it on the label.

The order matters. Disinfectant doesn't work well on a dirty surface, because grime protects germs and uses up the product. Spraying a sticky, dusty keyboard with disinfectant mostly just makes the keyboard wet. Clean first, then disinfect.

The part almost everyone gets wrong — Every disinfectant has a contact time on its label. The surface has to stay visibly wet for that long for the product to do its job. For some products that's 30 seconds. For others it's ten minutes. If someone sprays and wipes straight away, that's a regular cleaning with extra steps. It happens constantly, in offices and in plenty of cleaning companies. Ask your cleaner what the contact time is on the product they use. If they don't know, you have your answer.

Where germs actually travel in an office — Not the floor. Floors look dirty, so they get the attention, but colds and flu mostly move around an office on hands. So the places that matter are the things lots of hands touch every day: door handles and push plates (especially washroom and kitchen doors), light switches, elevator buttons and stair rails, fridge and microwave and kettle handles in the staff kitchen, tap handles and coffee machine buttons, printers, copiers, and boardroom phones, boardroom tables and chair arms, and in the washrooms, flush levers, stall locks, taps, and soap dispensers.

Then there are desks. Most cleaners don't touch anything on a desk, and for good reason, since nobody wants their papers moved. That leaves keyboards, mice, and phones, some of the dirtiest things in the building, out of the routine. Either give people wipes for their own gear, or have staff clear their desks on set nights so your cleaner can include them.

What's realistic — For most offices, disinfecting those touchpoints every night from roughly November to March is a sensible step up. It's mostly a matter of adding some minutes to the existing clean, not bringing in a bigger crew, so the cost difference is usually small. Disinfecting the whole building every week isn't necessary. You'll also see companies selling one-off disinfecting fog or spray treatments. Those can have a place in specific situations, but a single treatment doesn't replace someone wiping down the door handles every day with the right product and giving it time to work.

One limit is worth saying plainly. Cleaning cuts down surface spread, but colds and flu also travel through the air. Good ventilation, hand soap that's actually in the dispensers, and people staying home when they're sick will do as much as any cleaning schedule.

What to ask your cleaner — What do you use for disinfecting, and does it have a DIN? What's the contact time, and how do you make sure it's met? Do you use separate cloths for washrooms and kitchens? Is your staff trained in WHMIS for the products they handle? Is touchpoint disinfecting part of my current scope, or an add-on? A good cleaner will answer those without having to go check.

If you'd like to see what a touchpoint round would look like in your space, call us at (778) 320-1636 and we'll walk through it with you. Our commercial cleaning checklist covers the rest of the routine.

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