Table of Contents
The short answer
An office needs three layers of cleaning. Every working day: the washrooms, the pantry, the bins, the surfaces many hands touch and the floor at the entrance. Every week: all the desks, every floor from wall to wall, the internal glass and a proper descale of the washroom fittings. Every month: the high and hidden places, which means the tops of cabinets, AC grilles, skirting boards, chair bases, the inside of the fridge and the grout in the washrooms. A few jobs sit outside all three and come round every few months, such as washing the carpets and the reception seating.
How much of the daily layer needs a paid cleaner depends on the office. Fifteen people who eat at their desks and share two washrooms need a visit every working day. Four people in a tidy consultancy can keep the daily layer going themselves and have a cleaner in once or twice a week. The tables below are split by zone, so you can cut the list to fit your own floor.
After-hours cleaning needs one fact stated plainly. IHR Dream Cleaning works every day, 8 AM – 8 PM, and the work has to be finished by closing time. For an office, 'after hours' therefore means an evening visit that ends by 8 PM or an early-morning visit that starts at 8 AM. We do not clean overnight. Office cleaning is booked by the hour from the same published list as our home visits: AED 55 for 1 hour, AED 65 for 2 hours, AED 30 an hour for 3–4 hours and AED 25 for each hour after that, per cleaner, VAT included. The whole table is on the price list.
What decides how often your office needs a cleaner
Washrooms and pantries set the pace, not the desks. A desk is used by one person, who mostly keeps it the way they like it. A washroom is used by everyone several times a day, and one pantry sink collects the cups of the whole floor. Count those rooms first, then go through the points below.
- People per washroom. Two washrooms shared by twenty people need attention every day. Shared by five, they can go two or three days.
- Visitors. A reception that receives clients, patients or customers is judged every morning, so its floor, glass door and seating are daily jobs even in a small office.
- Food. Where lunch is reheated or eaten at desks there are crumbs, spills and food waste by mid-afternoon, and food waste left in a bin overnight is what brings cockroaches and ants into an office.
- Floor type. Carpet hides dust for a few days and then holds on to it. A dark polished tile at the entrance shows every footprint by the afternoon.
- Location. Fine dust comes in at every door in Abu Dhabi, and faster in the industrial districts, so an office beside a workshop needs its floors done more often than a sealed floor in a tower.
- Shared or assigned desks. Hot desks change hands daily and are daily jobs. Assigned desks can wait for the weekly clean.
| Office | A sensible starting point |
|---|---|
| Up to about 5 people, few visitors | One or two visits a week |
| 6 to 15 people with one pantry | Three visits a week, or every working day |
| More than 15 people, or visitors every day | Every working day |
| Clinic, salon or shop open to the public | Every day it trades |
| Office beside a workshop or warehouse | Every working day for floors and washrooms |
How to adjust it
These rows are starting points that follow from how the dirt builds, not rules. Run the pattern for two weeks and then read the signs. If the bins are full before the cleaner comes, or someone has started wiping the pantry themselves, the visits are too far apart. If the cleaner finishes the list with time to spare on every visit, either shorten the visit or keep the hours and give the spare time to the monthly list further down.
Daily tasks, zone by zone
These are the jobs that cannot wait for the end of the week, because the dirt they deal with is made fresh every day. In an office without a daily cleaner, somebody on the staff has to own them, and it is better to name that person than to hope.
| Zone | Every working day | Why it cannot wait |
|---|---|---|
| Reception | Wipe the counter, door handles and chair arms; straighten the seating; empty the bin | It is the first thing a visitor sees and the door everyone touches |
| Desks | Empty the desk bins; wipe hot desks and shared counters | Shared surfaces change hands every day |
| Meeting rooms | Clear cups and bottles; wipe the table; push the chairs in | The next meeting may be with a client |
| Pantry | Counters, sink and taps; microwave door and handle; table; food bin out | Food residue left overnight draws insects |
| Washrooms | Toilets, basins, taps and mirrors; floor mopped; bins emptied; soap and paper checked | Used by everyone, several times a day |
| Floors | Vacuum or dust-mop the entrance and main walkways; mop up spills | Grit at the door scratches tile and grinds into carpet |
| Glass | Spot-wipe fingerprints on the entrance door and its handle | Marks at hand height show by midday |
The touch points that get forgotten
The surfaces that pass most between hands are rarely the obvious ones. A daily wipe should take in the list below, with a clean cloth that is damp and not dripping. On anything electrical the cloth should be barely damp, and nothing should be sprayed straight onto a panel, a keypad or a switch.
- Door handles and push plates, including the inside of the washroom door.
- Light switches and the AC control panel.
- Fridge, microwave and kettle handles, and the buttons of the coffee machine and the water dispenser.
- Tap levers, flush buttons and soap dispensers.
- Printer panels, shared phone handsets, meeting-room remote controls and the keypad at the door.
If the cleaner does not come every day
On the days between visits the daily layer still has to happen, and it takes about fifteen minutes if it is shared. Cups are washed before people leave. The last person out takes the food bin to the building's waste room and wipes the pantry counter. This matters for the cost as much as for the look of the place: a cleaner who arrives to three days of cups and a full food bin spends the first half hour on work that is not cleaning, and the booked hours run whether or not the list is reached.
Weekly tasks, zone by zone
The weekly layer is the full clean: every surface and the whole floor, not only the parts in daily use. In an office cleaned every day, pick one day of the week for it and book a longer visit on that day. In an office cleaned once a week, this list and the daily list are the same visit.
| Zone | Once a week | Watch for |
|---|---|---|
| Reception | Dust every surface, shelf and display; vacuum the seating; wipe the skirting by the entrance | Dust on dark counters and behind the screen |
| Desks | Wipe all cleared desks, phone handsets and chair arms; dust monitors and stands with a dry cloth | Desks left covered in papers, which are skipped |
| Meeting rooms | Wipe chair arms, remote controls and the screen frame; wash the whiteboard | Marker dust on the tray and the floor below it |
| Pantry | Inside the microwave; fridge door, handle and seal; kettle and coffee machine outside; cupboard fronts; bin washed | The sticky strip under the coffee machine |
| Washrooms | Descale taps and basins; wipe wall tiles at splash height, cubicle doors and locks; floor edges and behind the toilet | White scale around the base of each tap |
| Floors | Vacuum wall to wall, under the desks included; mop all hard floors into the corners | Cable runs and the edges of chair mats |
| Glass | Internal partitions and glass doors, both sides, as high as a step ladder safely reaches | Marks at hand and shoulder height |
Desks, papers and equipment
A cleaner should never have to decide whether a sheet of paper matters. The usual rule is a clear-desk one: a cleared desk is wiped, and a desk with papers on it is dusted around or left alone. Tell the team which rule you want and tell your staff the same thing, or the same three desks will be skipped every week and nobody will know why.
Our practice with electronics is on the service page: desks and screens are wiped with suitable cloths, and the team does not unplug or move equipment without permission. The dust behind a monitor on a crowded desk therefore stays until someone moves the monitor. If you want cable trays cleaned, ask for it on a day when your own staff can shift the equipment first.
Why washroom taps scale so quickly here
Abu Dhabi's tap water is hard, and wherever it dries it leaves a white mineral film. In a washroom used dozens of times a day the taps are wet and drying again from morning to evening. Wiped dry daily and descaled weekly, the film never hardens into the crust that forms around the base of a neglected tap. One caution: descalers are acids, and acid leaves permanent dull marks on marble and other natural stone. If the vanity top or the floor is stone, point it out at the first visit so that neutral products are used on it.
Monthly and quarterly tasks
Some dirt builds too slowly to notice from one week to the next. It shows as a grey line along the skirting, a dark rim on an AC grille or a smell when the fridge door opens. Give these jobs one longer visit a month, or add one zone's monthly list to each weekly visit in rotation.
| Zone | Once a month | Every few months |
|---|---|---|
| Reception | Tops of cabinets, picture frames and light fittings within step-ladder reach; AC grilles | Seating washed |
| Desks | Under and behind the desks; chair bases and castors; drawer fronts | Fabric desk screens vacuumed |
| Meeting rooms | Chair upholstery vacuumed; table legs and bases; air vents | Carpet washed |
| Pantry | Fridge emptied and its shelves washed; inside the cupboards; behind small appliances | Deep clean and degrease |
| Washrooms | Grout lines scrubbed; extractor grille; partition tops and door frames | Deep clean and full descale |
| Floors | Skirting boards, corners and thresholds by hand | Carpets washed; tiled floors machine-scrubbed |
| Glass | The inside of the windows, with frames and sills | Outside glass, where it can be reached safely |
Carpets and reception seating are separate jobs
Routine vacuuming is part of an office visit. Washing a carpet is not. Spot stains and the dark lanes that form between the door and the desks are handled as carpet cleaning at AED 10 per square metre, and reception sofas are washed at AED 30 per seat, with a minimum order of AED 100 for priced items on one visit. Fabric jobs are confirmed from photos, so send pictures of the carpet and its worst patches when you ask. The method is described on the carpet cleaning page.
The fridge needs a named day
Counters, the sink, the microwave and the appliance fronts are cleaned on every visit. Emptying and washing the fridge can be added on a set day. Tell your staff which day, because a cleaner cannot know whose lunch is whose and should not have to throw food away on a guess.
Outside glass, machine-scrubbed floors and deep cleans
Inside glass, and anything that can be reached from the floor or a step ladder, is ordinary cleaning. Outside glass above ground level on a tower is specialist access work and has to be confirmed separately, as the window cleaning page explains. A machine scrub of tiled floors and grout is usually due every six to twelve months, with greying grout lines as the sign. A deep clean of the pantry and washrooms is booked as a deep clean, which starts at 2 cleaners for 3 hours each.
The order of work on a visit
A list tells the cleaner what to do. The order decides whether the result lasts until morning. The sequence our teams follow in an office is desks and touch points, meeting rooms, pantry, washrooms, bins, then floors. The reasons are worth knowing, because they tell you what to expect of any cleaner.
- Desks and touch points first. Dusting sends particles downwards, so surfaces are done while the floor is still dirty.
- Meeting rooms next. Tables and chair arms are wiped, and cups and bottles are carried out to the pantry.
- The pantry after the rooms that feed it, so the counters and the sink are cleaned once every cup has been brought in.
- Washrooms after the pantry, with their own cloths. A cloth that has been used in a washroom never goes back to a desk or a kitchen counter, and a careful team keeps separate colours for the two.
- Bins once every room is finished, so that the rubbish made by the cleaning itself goes out with the rest. Food waste should leave the office, not just the room.
- Floors last. They are vacuumed before they are mopped, and mopped from the far end back towards the door so that nobody walks over a wet floor.
- The report. The team leader confirms what was done and flags anything that needs your attention, such as a leaking tap or soap that is about to run out.
How after-hours visits work
Most offices do not want a vacuum cleaner running during a client call, and most cleaners work faster in an empty room. The answer is a visit at the edge of the working day. With us that edge has fixed limits.
The two windows: early morning and evening
Our working day is 8 AM – 8 PM, every day of the week. A visit can start at 8 AM, and whatever its length it has to be finished by 8 PM. Inside those limits two slots suit an office: the time before your staff arrive, and the hours after they leave. Evening is the more common choice, and a clean that starts at about 5 PM works for most offices.
Overnight cleaning, with a team arriving late at night or before dawn, is not something we offer. An office that truly needs it should look for a contractor that runs night shifts.
| Visit length | Latest evening start | Done by, if started at opening |
|---|---|---|
| 1 hour | 7 PM | 9 AM |
| 2 hours | 6 PM | 10 AM |
| 3 hours | 5 PM | 11 AM |
Morning or evening: which suits an office better
Evening is the better default for most offices. Morning suits shops and clinics that trade into the evening, and offices where nobody can stay behind to hand over.
| Question | Evening visit | Early-morning visit |
|---|---|---|
| What is removed | The whole day's dirt, the same day | Yesterday's dirt, after a night |
| Food waste | Out of the building before night | Sits in the bins overnight |
| Time available | Several hours before our closing time | Only the gap between our opening and yours |
| Floors | Dry by morning | May still be damp at the door |
| Access | A member of staff hands over, then stays or leaves | Someone has to open up early |
What the short morning window costs
The morning window is short because our day and most office days start within an hour of each other. If your staff arrive at 9 AM, a visit that starts at 8 AM has one hour. A list that needs two cleaner-hours then takes two cleaners for an hour each, which is AED 110 with your own products. One cleaner for two hours in the evening is AED 65. The work is the same. The difference is that the first hour of any visit is the dearest hour on the price list, and the morning plan buys two first hours. If the morning is the only window you have, tell us your opening time when you book, so that the team is sized to finish before your staff or customers arrive.
If your workplace is open until our closing time or later
Some workplaces have no empty evening: shops in a mall, clinics with late appointments, teams that work shifts. Three options stay inside our hours. Book the early-morning window. Choose the quietest hour of the working day for the washrooms, the pantry and the bins, and keep the vacuuming for a time when the floor is empty. Or move the full clean to a Friday, a weekend day or a public holiday, when the price is the same as on any other day.
Keys, access cards and building security
Access is settled before the first visit, not at the door. That covers who holds the keys or the access card, whether the building wants the cleaners registered at the security desk, and whether it asks for a contractor's work permit or a named contact. We ask for these details when you book, and the arrangement that suits your office and your building is agreed then.
One cost is worth avoiding. If the team travels to the office and cannot get in, because nobody is there, the key was not left or the access card does not work, the visit is charged at AED 60. It nearly always comes from an arrangement that lived in one person's head, on the week that person was on leave.
Buildings differ by district. In Al Markaziyah, the old central business district, offices and towers have security desks and service lifts, and many ask for a work permit or a named contact for contractors. On Al Maryah Island the towers run visitor registration and service-lift bookings. In Al Muroor the buildings on the main roads have little visitor parking. The routine most towers share is in booking a cleaner in an Abu Dhabi tower.
- Who lets the team in and who locks up: one named person, with a phone that is answered during the visit, and a second name for when the first is away.
- The building's own hours. Ask the building management whether the lifts, the service entrance, the lighting and the air conditioning run as normal in the evening and at weekends.
- Registration and permits. Ask the security desk what it needs for a contractor working outside office hours, and how far in advance.
- The alarm, if there is one: who sets it, and what the team should do if it sounds.
- Rooms that stay locked, such as a server room or a file room, and whether their bins will be put outside the door.
What the hourly booking covers, and what it does not
An office visit with us is cleaners' time, bought by the hour and spent on an agreed checklist. Two things are often assumed to be inside that hour and are not: the cleaning equipment, unless you choose the with-materials option at AED 5 more per cleaner-hour, and the washroom consumables.
With our materials or with yours
With materials, the team brings cleaning liquids and sprays, vacuum cleaner, mop and bucket, broom, microfibre cloths and rags, step ladder. Without, the office supplies everything, the vacuum and the mop included, and if something essential is missing on the day the booked hours still run. An office cleaned several times a week usually finds it simpler to keep its own kit in a cupboard. An office cleaned once a week often prefers not to store a vacuum cleaner at all. The longer comparison is in cleaning with or without materials.
Soap, tissue and other consumables
Consumables and washroom supplies are not part of the hourly cleaning rate. Unless something different has been agreed with us in advance, plan on the office buying its own hand soap, toilet tissue, paper towels and bin liners, and keeping them where the team can find them. What the team does is tell you when the stock is running low, so the washroom does not run out in the middle of a working day.
What a schedule costs
Office cleaning uses the same price list as a home visit, with no contract fee and no minimum term. Our guide for a small office of up to around ten desks is one cleaner for two to three hours a visit. Daily visits are shorter than weekly ones, because less builds up between them. Larger offices take two or more cleaners, so that the visit fits the quiet window before or after the working day.
Regular visits cost less: 10% off every two weeks, 15% off weekly and 20% off for two or more visits a week (5% monthly). The discount comes off every visit. The table shows four common patterns for one cleaner with our materials; with your own products each cleaner-hour is AED 5 less.
| Pattern | Each visit | Each week |
|---|---|---|
| One 3-hour visit a week | AED 89 | AED 89 |
| Three 2-hour visits a week | AED 60 | AED 180 |
| Five 2-hour visits a week | AED 60 | AED 300 |
| Five 1-hour visits a week | AED 48 | AED 240 |
What the table shows
Compare the second row with the last. Three two-hour visits give six hours of cleaning for AED 180 a week. Five one-hour visits give five hours for AED 240. The shorter visits cost more for less time, because every visit begins with the dearest hour on the list. A daily one-hour visit is still the right choice where the washrooms cannot go a day without attention. Where they can, three longer visits and a staff routine on the other two days is the better use of the money.
If you are weighing these figures against a contractor's monthly quote, compare the cleaner-hours inside each and what is excluded, not the headline. The method is in how to compare cleaning quotes.
Payment and changes
Payment is by card, online. A regular plan has no contract and no paying ahead for future visits, and a tax invoice is available on request for any booking. A visit can be moved or cancelled free of charge up to 6 hours before it starts; later than that the charge is AED 30. The terms are on the cancellation policy page.
Setting up the first visit
An office schedule fails in the first fortnight or not at all, and it fails on small things: a key, a locked cupboard, a desk nobody was told to leave alone. This is the order to settle them in.
- Describe the space when you book: the approximate floor area, the number of workstations, washrooms and pantries, and the hours when the office is empty.
- Agree the hours and the checklist. We suggest the number of cleaners and the hours, and the checklist the team will follow on every visit. Keep a copy of that list in the office.
- Name the contact the team reports to on arrival, and mark what is off limits: the rooms that are confidential, and the desks and papers that must not be touched.
- Decide where things live: a cupboard or a corner for the equipment, and a shelf for the supplies if the office provides them.
- Give the first visit more time. A first clean takes longer than the ones that follow, and is often booked with two cleaners so that it fits a single evening or a weekend slot.
Checking the work when nobody was there to watch
After an evening clean the check happens the next morning, and it takes two minutes if you know where to look. The places below show whether the list was followed, because they are the ones a hurried cleaner skips.
If something on the agreed list was missed, tell us within 24 hours of the visit and it is put right at no charge. A photograph helps the team see exactly what you mean. The same checklist is used on every visit, and we keep a note of each office's access and preferences, so that a different cleaner can step in without being briefed from the beginning.
- The base of each washroom tap: dry, with no white ring.
- Behind the toilet and in the floor corners of the washroom.
- The pantry sink and its drainer: empty and wiped.
- Desk bins: all of them emptied, not only the full ones.
- The floor under the meeting-room table.
- The glass of the entrance door at hand height.
Clinics, shops and workshop offices
The three lists above were written for an ordinary office. Other workplaces use the same zones with different weights.
Clinics
We clean the general areas of a clinic: reception, waiting rooms, washrooms and offices. Clinical waste and the sterilising of medical equipment stay with the clinic's own staff. In a busy waiting room the chair arms, the reception counter and the washroom touch points need wiping more than once a day, which is a job for the clinic's staff between a cleaner's visits. If your own protocol sets requirements for how general areas are cleaned, give them to the team before the first visit.
Shops, showrooms and salons
A shop is cleaned for its customers: the floor, the displays, the glass that can be reached safely and the customer washroom, timed so that the team has finished before the doors open. A salon adds cut hair and wet floors, so it needs a clean every day it trades, with the wash basins, the mirrors and the whole floor on the list.
Workshop and warehouse offices
An office inside an industrial site collects dust faster than any tower floor, and the site has gate security, safety rules and shift times of its own. We clean the offices, pantries, washrooms and staff areas of such sites, not the machinery or any hazardous area. Dust, shifts and site access are covered in cleaning offices and staff accommodation in Musaffah and Al Mafraq.
Common questions
Our office hours change in Ramadan and in summer. Can the slot move?
Yes. A plan is a repeating booking, so its time can be changed, and any single visit can be moved free of charge up to 6 hours before it starts. Tell us the new closing time as soon as you know it. An earlier close opens a longer evening window, and a longer window may let one cleaner do what two were booked for.
How many cleaners does an office need?
Think in cleaner-hours first, then divide them to fit your window. Six cleaner-hours can be one cleaner for six hours or three cleaners for two. Up to 4 cleaners can be booked on one visit, for up to 8 hours each. More cleaners finish sooner and cost a little more for the same hours, because a longer visit is cheaper per hour: two cleaners for two hours each are AED 130, and one cleaner for four hours is AED 120. Choose by the time the office is empty, not by the price difference.
Will the same cleaner come every time?
Regular customers keep the same cleaners wherever the schedule allows. It cannot be promised for every visit, because people take leave and fall ill. That is the reason the checklist is written down and the access notes are kept on file: the office should get the same clean from whoever comes.
What happens if the cleaner finishes early, or runs out of time?
You pay for the hours you booked. If the list is finished early, the cleaner stays for the remaining time and uses it on whatever else you ask for, which is a good moment for a job from the monthly list. If the office needs longer, the team asks first, and extra time is added in steps of 30 minutes only with your approval. In the evening an extension is possible only while it still ends by closing time.
Can we book a clean for today, before a client visit or an audit?
Often, yes. A same-day visit needs about 2 hours of notice and depends on which teams are free, and it costs the same as a visit booked a week ahead. Say what the occasion is, because an audit, a landlord's inspection and a client visit each put the weight on different rooms. How late you can leave it is explained in same-day cleaning in Abu Dhabi.
Putting the schedule to work
Start with the three tables. Strike out the zones your office does not have, decide which daily jobs your own staff will keep, and what is left is the cleaner's checklist. Then choose the window: evening if someone can hand over, early morning if not.
The office cleaning page describes what our visits cover and how the hours are suggested. When you are ready, choose the day, the number of cleaners and the hours, and whether we bring the materials. The price is shown before you confirm, and payment is by card online. You can book the first visit online in a few minutes.
