Why We’re a Living Wage Cleaning Company & How It Benefits You

Posted by Marketing, December 01, 2021

At Glenn Cleaning & Support Services, we believe that paying our staff the real Living Wage is simply the right thing to do. However, it’s not something that benefits just us and our cleaners – there are also a large number of benefits to you as our customer. 

So that you can better understand why we encourage you to choose to pay the real Living Wage to your cleaning crew managed by Glenn, we’ve put together the article below. In it, we talk about some of the benefits of the real Living Wage scheme for everyone involved. Let’s jump right in.

What is the real Living Wage?  

The real Living Wage is a rate of pay calculated to cover an employee’s basic needs: food, accommodation and other, ordinary requirements of a decent way of life. The current Living Wage rate is £11.05 in London and £9.90 everywhere else. The scheme is completely voluntary.

We should also make clear the distinction between the so-called “real Living Wage” versus National Living Wage schemes. 

The National Living Wage is a government scheme that shares its aims of playing fair wages with the Living Wage Foundation. However, these rates are lower than the real Living Wage. 

This is because while the Living Wage Foundation calculates its rates independently based on the average cost of living, the National Living Wage is based on the average earnings of UK workers.

How COVID-19 has changed things     

While cleaners have typically been undervalued and considered unskilled workers, the pandemic has reminded us that they are key to our workplaces, schools and communities remaining safe for us to access.

COVID-19 has also underlined the critical importance of attracting and retaining good people, as the recruitment pool has shrunk significantly because of the pandemic. Many foreign workers have returned to their countries of origin to help in a time of crisis, while many others have accepted work in different sectors and are reluctant to risk the disruption of changing jobs yet again. 

Benefits of paying cleaners the real Living Wage

1. Recruiting high-quality staff in a tight market

Because of the above, recruitment in the commercial cleaning services industry is becoming a “seller’s market”. Efficient, reliable people are in great demand in our industry and many others. 

If we want to employ and secure the services of people dedicated to their career in the facilities services industry, we have to offer them a competitive pay rate. It’s as simple as that. This way, your facilities can be cared for by the very best.

2. Higher productivity

Cleaning is taxing work. If we were to pay our commercial cleaners the minimum wage, it would be understandable if they weren’t as committed to us as their employer or the cleaning results they were delivering.

We want our cleaning staff to take pride in the work they do and feel empowered in their careers. This is hard to do if you feel underappreciated and have to worry about how you’re going to pay your bills.

By offering our cleaners a wage they can realistically live off of, we communicate to them that their work matters. And when we do this, they feel more invested in their work. This, in turn, leads to a higher quality cleaning service for you.

3. Retaining our cleaning staff

The Living Wage Foundation’s survey found that 75% of participating organisations had seen an increase in their staff’s motivation and retention. When we offer our cleaning staff support and appreciation, we not only attract the best workers – we also retain them for longer. And that can only be good for you as our customer. 

We’re very proud of the fact that our average length of service is higher than the industry average: it currently sits at six years. In large part, we believe this is due to our commitment to the Living Wage scheme.

When people are fairly treated and compensated, they have little reason to change employers. And as a result, they have more time to dedicate to building their expertise through experience and training programmes. 

So from our point of view, it’s a no-brainer. When an emergency arises, well-paid employees are more willing to go the extra mile for our commercial cleaning clients. And with low staff turnover, our clients can also expect to receive a consistently high-quality cleaning service they’d struggle to get if their premises were cleaned by a new crew every month.

Benefits of the Living Wage for our clients

As the points we’ve already made prove, the ultimate beneficiary of our real Living Wage policy is you as our customer. 

Commercial cleaners who are fairly paid are bound to feel more appreciated than they would if they were paid the minimum wage. This makes them more engaged and dedicated and as a result, better at their job.

So when you’re shopping around for commercial cleaning quotes, keep that in mind. The cost of labour from your cleaners is what makes up the lion’s share of your quote. A very low quote likely means their cleaners are likely underpaid (or that enough hours haven’t been allocated for the job to be done properly). This in turn can mean high staff turnover and poor quality cleaning for you.

How the Real Living Wage works at Glenn

At Glenn Cleaning & Support Services, we present all our new clients with two quotes: one where cleaners are offered the real Living Wage and one where they aren’t. We provide information on the benefits of the former but the choice is ultimately up to you.

When you appoint Glenn as your contract cleaning service provider and choose the real Living Wage, you do so knowing your cleaners will be well-trained and motivated staff who have every reason to carry out their work to the very best of their abilities.  

Interested in learning more about how we operate? Get in touch with us today.