What to specify before a handover clean

The site-readiness, access and timing details a handover-clean booking needs in writing before you confirm it, so the quote matches the job you actually get.

A handover-clean quote is priced against what you tell the contractor it covers. If the site turns out to be in a different state on the day, or the crew can't get in when they arrive, the booking either slips or misses part of the job. Specifying the job properly before you book heads off both outcomes.

This is the single-booking version of the question. Handover cleans across a build program covers the same ground for a site supervisor running the same kind of clean on a rotating basis across several lots; this guide is for getting one booking right from a standing start.

Confirm the site is actually ready to scope

A contractor can only quote accurately against the site as it will be on the clean date, and that date is set by whichever trade finishes last. Walk the site against what still has to happen before the clean can start, and tell the contractor which of these are already closed out when you book.

A site supervisor managing several trades at once is often the only person positioned to check all of these at the same time; a quote taken before they're confirmed is a quote against a guess.

• Paint touch-ups finished, including skirting, architraves and door frames as well as the main wall surfaces.
• Flooring laid, and still under its protective covering if it needs to be.
• Cabinetry, joinery and fixtures installed, so the clean crew isn't working around another trade still fitting them.
• The rooms the clean will cover no longer an active work zone for another trade.
• Window and glazing protective film either still on, if removing it is part of the clean, or already removed.

Specify site access in the booking

A crew that can't get into the site, or can't get the power and water they need, loses the slot you booked for them, regardless of how accurate the rest of the quote was.

None of this is information a contractor can find out for themselves before arriving; it has to come from whoever is running the site.

• Who holds the key or access code on the day, and how the crew collects it.
• Where the crew can park, particularly on a site with limited street frontage or hoarding out front.
• Whether power and water are connected and turned on for the areas being cleaned.
• Whether another trade is rostered on site the same day, and what rooms that affects.

Specify timing as a date window

A single fixed date assumes nothing upstream moves, and on an active build something usually does. Give the contractor a window around the expected handover instead, and name who confirms it.

The same window and the same named contact can carry over to every booking on the same job, so this only has to be agreed once per site.

• A date range around the expected handover, wide enough to absorb a trade finishing a day or two late.
• How much notice the contractor needs if that date range moves.
• Who is authorised to confirm the site is ready and release the booking to go ahead.

Put it in one brief

The readiness state, the access details and the date window belong in the same document handed to the contractor when you book, so both sides are working from the same written record instead of a phone call each one remembers differently.

How to choose a builders clean contractor covers vetting the contractor itself; use this brief alongside it for the specifics of the job.