How to Write a Commercial Cleaning RFP: NYC Checklist
A strong commercial cleaning RFP does four things: it defines the scope of work by area, task, and frequency; it states your insurance, licensing, and compliance minimums; it requires a pre-bid walkthrough; and it tells vendors exactly how their bids will be scored. Get those four elements right and qualified NYC contractors can price your building accurately, which means you can compare bids fairly.
This guide walks property managers, facility directors, general contractors, and practice administrators through each section of a commercial cleaning RFP, with a 10-step checklist you can adapt for a single building or a full portfolio.
Why the RFP Matters More Than the Bids
Most bad cleaning contracts are not caused by bad vendors. They are caused by vague RFPs. When a request for proposal says little more than “keep the building clean,” every bidder fills the gaps with their own assumptions. One vendor prices nightly restroom service, another prices three nights a week, and the numbers that come back are not comparable. The low bid usually belongs to whoever assumed the least, and the difference shows up later as complaints, change orders, and a mid-contract rebid.
A precise RFP flips that dynamic. It forces every bidder to price the same building, the same tasks, and the same frequencies, so the spread between bids reflects real differences in staffing, supervision, and efficiency rather than differences in guesswork.
The 10-Step Commercial Cleaning RFP Checklist
Work through these steps in order. Each one closes a gap that bidders would otherwise fill with assumptions.
- Describe the property. Address, total cleanable square footage, number of floors, space types (office, lobby, medical, retail, common areas), typical occupancy, and hours of operation. If you manage multiple buildings, break these details out per site.
- Define the scope of work. List tasks by area with explicit frequencies: daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly. This is the single most important section of the document.
- Set the service window. State whether you need day porter coverage, after-hours service, overnight crews, or weekend work. Include building access rules, freight elevator hours, and any security or ID badging procedures.
- Assign supply responsibility. Specify who provides consumables (paper products, soap, trash liners) and confirm the vendor supplies its own equipment and cleaning chemicals.
- State vendor qualification minimums. Require a certificate of insurance with general liability and workers’ compensation, with the building owner and managing agent named as additional insured. Require background-checked staff, OSHA-compliant practices, and references from comparable NYC buildings.
- Schedule a mandatory pre-bid walkthrough. Publish the date in the RFP and make attendance a condition of bidding. A vendor who has not walked the building is pricing a guess.
- Standardize the bid format. Provide one pricing table every vendor must complete: monthly price for the defined scope, plus hourly or unit rates for extras such as carpet extraction, floor restoration, and post-construction cleanup.
- Publish the evaluation criteria. Tell bidders how proposals will be weighted before they submit. Serious contractors write better proposals when they know what you value.
- Set the timeline. Include the RFP release date, walkthrough date, question deadline, bid due date, award date, and contract start date.
- Define the contract terms. Contract length, termination and cure provisions, inspection and reporting expectations, and how scope changes will be priced.
Defining the Scope of Work: The Section Vendors Read First
Break tasks out by area and frequency
Do not describe outcomes (“floors should look clean”). Describe tasks and how often they happen. A simple table format keeps bidders honest and gives you an inspection standard once the contract starts. Here is a condensed example for an office property:
| Area | Task | Frequency |
|---|---|---|
| Lobby and entrances | Sweep, damp mop, entrance glass, high-touch disinfection | Daily |
| Restrooms | Clean and disinfect all fixtures, restock consumables | Daily |
| Offices and workstations | Trash removal, dusting, vacuuming of traffic lanes | Daily or per schedule |
| Pantries and break rooms | Wipe counters and appliance exteriors, clean floors | Daily |
| Hard floors | Machine scrub or buff | Monthly |
| Carpeted areas | Hot water extraction | Quarterly |
| Interior glass and partitions | Full wash within reach | Quarterly |
Adjust frequencies to your building class and traffic. Medical and dental suites, food service areas, and fitness amenities need their own line items with disinfection protocols spelled out.
Decide day porter versus after-hours coverage
These are different services with different pricing. A day porter keeps lobbies, restrooms, and common areas presentable while the building is occupied. After-hours crews handle the full nightly scope. Many NYC properties need both, and your RFP should price them as separate line items so you can adjust coverage without renegotiating the whole contract.
Portfolio managers: standardize across buildings
If you oversee several properties, use one scope template across the portfolio and vary only the per-building details. Consolidating under a single vendor for property management cleaning in NYC typically simplifies invoicing, gives you one accountable supervisor, and makes portfolio-wide inspections consistent. Your RFP should ask bidders to price each building separately and as a bundle.
Vendor Requirements Worth Insisting On in NYC
New York City buildings carry requirements that generic RFP templates miss. Build these into your qualification section:
- Insurance sized to your building. Ask your ownership or risk team for the required general liability limits, and require the COI to name the owner and managing agent as additional insured before work begins.
- Background-checked, trained crews. Your tenants’ security teams will expect it, and buildings with ID badging cannot onboard staff without it.
- Professional affiliations and compliance. ISSA membership and documented OSHA-compliant training programs are reasonable signals that a contractor runs a real operation rather than a subcontracted crew.
- Verifiable track record. References from comparable buildings are the minimum. Publicly recorded contracts are stronger, because you can verify them independently. Government work is a useful signal here: city and public-authority contracts require vendors to clear procurement vetting that private references do not.
- Certifications where they matter. If your building is city-funded or your ownership has supplier diversity goals, ask bidders to state WBE, MBE, DBE, or SBE certifications and any city vendor registrations in their proposals.
How to Score the Bids
Publish your weights in the RFP itself. Here is a sample weighting that many property managers adapt; shift the percentages to match your priorities, but keep price below half so the scope quality of the proposal still matters:
| Criterion | Sample weight |
|---|---|
| Price for the defined scope | 30% |
| Comparable NYC experience and references | 25% |
| Staffing plan and supervision model | 20% |
| Compliance: insurance, certifications, background checks | 15% |
| Transition plan and start-up readiness | 10% |
Pay particular attention to the supervision model. Ask each bidder who inspects the work, how often, and what reporting you will receive. A contractor that cannot describe its quality control process in writing will not deliver one in your building.
Common RFP Mistakes That Attract the Wrong Bidders
- Skipping the walkthrough. Bids priced sight unseen are guesses, and guesses become change orders.
- Writing an outcomes-only scope. “Maintain a high standard of cleanliness” is not a scope. It is an invitation to underbid.
- Scoring on price alone. The lowest bid on a vague scope is often the most expensive contract you can sign once turnover, missed frequencies, and rebid costs are counted.
- Accepting free-form proposals. Without a standard bid table, you will spend days normalizing numbers that still will not line up.
- Ignoring the transition. Ask how the vendor onboards a new building: staffing, keys and access, supply stocking, and the first 30 days of inspections.
- Leaving out growth work. Get unit pricing for post-construction cleaning, floor restoration, and emergency response now, while you have leverage, rather than mid-contract.
A Realistic Timeline
For a single building, plan on roughly four to eight weeks from RFP release to award: one to two weeks for vendors to review and attend the walkthrough, two to three weeks for questions and bid preparation, and one to two weeks for evaluation, interviews, and award. Add two to four weeks after award for transition before the start date, and more for large portfolios or buildings with security onboarding. Rushing the walkthrough and question period is the most common self-inflicted wound; it filters out careful bidders and leaves you with the guessers.
Planning an RFP for Your Building or Portfolio?
If you are preparing a commercial cleaning RFP, a documented walkthrough is the fastest way to turn a rough scope into a priced one. Clean2Clean provides commercial cleaning services in NYC for offices, medical and dental practices, retail, and managed properties across the five boroughs and tri-state area. Our teams bring 17+ years of experience in NYC facilities, and our track record is publicly verifiable: we are WBE, DBE, and SBE certified, hold NYC SBS vendor account 359863, and have completed publicly recorded contracts including a $301,000 NYCHA post-construction project and a $195,000 NYC DDC final cleaning contract. Every engagement starts the same way: we walk the property with you, document the scope room by room, and return a line-item quote you can drop directly into your bid comparison. Call 800-743-0121 or 646-639-7892, or email info@clean2clean.com to schedule a walkthrough.