British Institute of Cleaning Science, Setting standards


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Setting standards
April 01st 2010

BICSc is about improving training, setting standards, and helping build a better cleaning industry. For those who don’t already belong to the British Institute of Cleaning Science, or BICSc for short, it is the UK’s largest independent professional educational body within the cleaning industry, with a little short of 5,000 members.

2010 is already a seminal year for BICSc, with the launches in January of new Accredited Cleaning Systems Standards for cleaning equipment and systems manufactured and/or marketed by Corporate Members of the Institute, in February of a major campaign to establish a voluntary Code of Standards as a means of demonstrating due diligence in undertaking a contract, and in April, at the Interclean exhibition in Amsterdam, of BICSc International, the new international trading arm of the institute, established to further co-operation and raise standards in the international cleaning community. BICSc International will provide Accreditation Standards in other countries in the same way that the BICSc Accreditation Scheme does in the UK, with the auditing of quality standards initially carried out in the UK until auditing teams have been established in other countries.

Training and improvement of standards has always been the prime motivation of everything BICSc does. The institute does not itself run training courses, but sets standards and inspects training organisations that run cleaning industry courses, awarding the distinction of Accredited Training Provider to those that fully meet the Institute’s standards.

The Institute has on its web site, www.bics.org.uk, a search facility to enable people needing training in cleaning techniques and technologies to find Accredited Training Providers in their part of the country and information on becoming an approved trainer.

Clicking on FAQs on the web site produces a detailed summary of how trainers and training companies can gain recognised status as BICSc Accredited Training Providers. Stan Atkins, chief executive officer of BICSc, urges anybody in the industry who wants training in any particular aspect of cleaning to contact several training organisations for quotes, and to check that the business they decide to use is a BICSc Approved Training Centre before commissioning the training. They can do this by phoning BICSc on 01604 678710.

Accreditation

BICSc recently launched Accredited Cleaning Systems Standards for cleaning equipment and systems. The accreditation scheme field-tests cleaning equipment and materials under normal working conditions and gives accreditation based on efficiency and other criteria. It is believed that the Standards will quickly become a measure by which cleaners and those who manufacture their machines and products will be able show that they used best practice. Once the Standards become the acknowledged measure of best practice, everyone in the industry will seek to be measured by them.

The accreditation consists of three elements:

• The product

• Adequate training in the product

• Testing and validation of the product in field conditions

The testing is carried out under genuinely realistic, practical, dirty conditions – we really test the product in the field. The accreditation enables you and your customers to be confident that the operatives, the occupants and the fabric of the building being cleaned are protected from design flaws or inadequacies of the cleaning products being used.

Survival in tough times

“BICSc has grown and innovated throughout the recession and is still helping professional cleaners to do the same,” explains Stan Atkins. “The key to growth in difficult times is offering assured standards and value for money. BICSc is constantly helping cleaning businesses to do just that.”

More articles from British Institute of Cleaning Science:

Don’t blame me (or As you like it?) (27th February 2008)

Thou cannot say I did it! Do not shake your gory locks at me,” says Macbeth to Banquo’s ghost in Shakespeare’s Macbeth. A similar reply may ring out in modern English by the Facilities Manager to a director of the client company. Lower down the ladder it is “Don’t blame me. I am only doing my job.”

From 2008

Improving the skills base (21st February 2007)

BICSc was founded in 1961 as the

From 2007

Improving the skills base (9th March 2006)

BICSc was founded in 1961 as the independent professional body of the UK cleaning industry. Our mission is to raise both professional status and standards within the industry, primarily through training and education.

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