Running a short and fair cleaner comparison for a Blacktown workplace

A single page is enough: the areas, the approximate size of each, the days and hours cleaning can occur, the frequency you have in mind, and anything unusual about access. Writing it forces you to decide what you actually want, which is harder than it sounds and is the step most buyers skip. It also means the three proposals answer the same question rather than three different ones.

Include what you are unsure about as well. If you do not know whether the carpets need periodic extraction or how often the windows should be done, say so and ask each provider to advise. Their answers become part of the comparison. A provider who recommends less than you expected, and explains why, is often more useful than one who agrees with everything in the brief.

Invite the same three people to walk the site, ideally within the same week, and tell each of them the same things. Do not share one provider's price with another, and do not tell anybody what you currently pay. If a provider asks a question during their visit that changes the brief, send the answer to all three so the comparison stays level and nobody is advantaged by having asked first.

Set a deadline and hold it. A fortnight from the walkthrough is ample for a proposal on a single premises, and a provider who cannot meet a simple deadline during the sales process is unlikely to improve afterwards. If somebody asks for an extension, grant it once and give the same extension to everyone rather than quietly running a different timetable for each and quietly favouring whoever complained loudest about the dates.

Write down what matters and roughly how much, before any figures arrive. For most workplaces that list is short: does the proposal cover the brief, who attends and who supervises, what evidence of insurance and screening exists, how faults are handled, and what it costs. Deciding the weighting in advance stops the cheapest number from quietly becoming the only criterion once you can see it.

Then read the proposals against those headings and make notes as you go. Where a proposal is silent on something, that is a finding rather than an omission to be filled in charitably on the provider's behalf. Ask the question, record the answer, and keep the notes. If somebody senior asks later why you chose as you did, a page of contemporaneous notes settles it immediately.