Day Porters

Day Porters: Silent Heroes in Commercial Properties

Commercial properties undergo wear and tear on a regular basis, whether it is a shopping center, medical office building, industrial facility, mixed-use project, or office building. Routine cleaning and maintenance tasks must be on the to-do list for every commercial property. It keeps your investment in top shape. In the world of business, impressions are everything, especially in a commercial establishment. A company supplying day porters will help improve the appearance of your facility and make the best impression on your employees, tenants, and customers.

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What’s a Day Porter?

Day porters provide many services like cleaning, basic maintenance, and upkeep services. These services ensure that dirt, dust, spills, and grime do not accumulate in the common areas, including restrooms.

As a commercial property manager, there are two options available to you, to avoid these unsavory consequences. You can hire your own in-house janitorial staff or you can hire a commercial cleaning company that provides day porter service. However hiring your crew comes with several challenges, which is why many property owners prefer to outsource porter staff.

The challenges of hiring an in-house cleaning crew include recruiting the right staff, training them, and appointing someone to supervise them. However, when you outsource a commercial cleaning service or a day porter service, you have no need to worry about anything.

Types of Duties

A day porter is someone who provides a wide array of daytime, typically during business hours, resources, related to cleaning, in a commercial facility or property. Day porters are the unseen heroes of commercial real estate assets, as they perform a myriad of key functions.

The duties of a porter typically include policing public areas, touching up restrooms, restocking consumable paper and soap supplies, policing entrance ways, changing light bulbs, picking up cigarette butts in smoking areas, checking cafeterias/coffee stations, cleaning up spills, completing specialty detail cleaning, and performing other duties as assigned by the Facility or Property Manager.

They are trained to work in high traffic areas and handle deep cleaning, trash removal, and simple repairs around the property while being as inconspicuous as possible.

If you’ve been wondering how a day porter is different than a janitor, here is your answer: a day porter provides more flexible tasks. Unlike a janitor (who perform task-specific cleaning), the following can be a list of duties day porters perform:

  • Inspecting and disinfecting all the high-traffic areas like the lobby and the restrooms.
  • Cleaning appliances like coffee makers and microwaves.
  • Keeping reception areas, offices, lunchrooms, and hallways clean and disinfected.
  • Cleaning the blinds and washing the windows.
  • Changing air filters in HVAC systems and light bulbs.
  • Drying wet floors and cleaning spills.
  • Removing debris/dirt from sidewalks, and picking up litter in the parking lots.
  • Removing ice and snow from the sidewalks, parking lots, and driveways.
  • Setting up for events, and cleaning up after the event is over.
  • Disinfecting and cleaning elevators.
  • Dusting and watering indoor plants.
  • Providing coffee services to the staff and customers.
  • Restocking towels.
  • Removing graffiti.
  • Doing basic property maintenance services.

Minimize the Risk of COVID-19 With Day Porter Service

Unfortunately, the novel COVID-19 doesn’t seem to be going away immediately. This means businesses, and the whole world, must adapt the cleaning systems to meet the challenges of the pandemic.

So, the first thing you need to understand is, a regular cleaning service is not cut out to deal with the virus. Are you one of those managers, who prefer to wait for the nightly crew to do the cleaning and disinfection across your facility? Remember that COVID-19 doesn’t just spread at night.

You should incorporate a day porters cleaning and disinfection services into your daily janitorial plan. Doing this will reduce the risk and spread of COVID-19. This will also let your staff and tenants know that you take their safety very seriously.

Using a day porter service offers you the ability to target high-traffic areas throughout the day. This includes an immediate response team to any potentially infected objects or surfaces. Having a qualified porter staff at your facility during business hours means you won’t have to wait for a special cleaning crew when you suspect an infection.

The porter staff can seal off the areas where a potentially infected individual was present, and disinfect those areas with the appropriate disinfectants straight away. It would potentially minimize the impact of any positive cases. It also helps to control the effect on your daily business operations.

Why Should Commercial Property Owners Hire Day Porters?

Well, you know what day porters bring to the table in terms of services. But, what exactly does that mean for YOU? Let’s break it down:

Enhanced Productivity

Furthermore, with a dedicated and professional porter staff in place to handle trash picking, changing light bulbs, cleaning up spills, and a million other tasks around your facility, your employees won’t have to waste their time on these non-essential tasks.

Your employees would have enhanced productivity when they focus on doing the jobs you hired them to do.

Day Porters play an important role in keeping the office customer-facing while allowing employees to stay productive during the day. Using green products helps day porters keep the heavy chemical smells down that can come about from things like bleach to make sure there are no distractions in the office for both employees and customers. Sal Galo, Owner, Beyond Eco Cleaning  

Quick Response Time

When there are new stains on carpeting or large spills on the floor, a day porter will address these concerns immediately. It leads to minimizing interruptions and reduces safety risks, and the efficiency of business operations is not compromised.

Day porters can also immediately re-supply restroom consumables that have unexpectedly run low and clean up infectious waste incidents.

Property or Facility Reputation

The lack of cleanliness and failure to comply with minor repair services, especially in common areas, would lead to serious consequences over time. It can lead to dissatisfaction among the building occupants. As a result, it may damage your reputation as a property manager, facility manager, or employer.

When you ignore hygiene or maintenance issues in your facility or property, it could increase the risk of liability. For example, if a tenant or employee gets injured on your property from maintenance issues you could be responsible

Happy employees can reduce staffing turnover and increase morale. Tenants who are pleased with building services are more likely to renew/extend their leases and recommend the property to others.

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How to Choose the Right Porter Service

Hiring a janitorial company that provides day porter services is better and more efficient than hiring an in-house cleaning crew. A reputable company not only screens hires, and trains individuals on their own dime, they also always have a backup plan option in case your regular day porter becomes unavailable.

A reputable day porter service is committed to making your facility or property run smoother. This allows you to focus on the big picture. Although there are many day porter companies around, not all day porter companies provide top-notch services.

Irrespective of the size of your requirement or your budget, it is imperative to ensure you choose a company that provides day porter services that meet the following criteria:

  • Be licensed, if applicable, and fully insured.
  • They should be trained in the latest cleaning techniques for your property type, especially if your business offers essential services like food processing, food packaging, pharmaceuticals, etc.
  • Must have a thorough knowledge of special cleaning and disinfecting methods in regards to COVID-19, such as electrostatic spraying.
  • They must have the latest, industrial-grade cleaning equipment, supplies, and gear.
  • They must be able to provide quality services without disrupting your day-to-day business operations.

The Best-In-Class Platform 

As a property or facility manager, if your goal is to provide top-notice customer service for your employees, tenants, and guests, and provide enhanced disinfection services, the best option is to engage Servi-Tek Facility Solutions for day porter services!

Servi-Tek Facility Solutions offers best-in-class employee screening, training, management oversight, transparency, and proprietary software – which includes Work Order and Inspection modules.

Do you want to know more about customized day porter services and how they can help you? Call us at 1-866-454-6185 or please contact us online, and our team will be happy to assist you.

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