Workforce calculation in cleaning: how it works
How many people does it take to keep a building clean? And at what FTE percentage? Workforce calculation answers exactly this question and translates the pure cleaning effort into a concrete staffing requirement.
What a workforce calculation is
A workforce calculation determines the staffing needs of a property from the sum of all the work that arises. It does not calculate with the current workload but with the work that actually has to be done: areas, coverings, intervals, outdoor areas, technical maintenance and administration. The result is an annual number of hours and, derived from it, a workload in FTE percent.
The method comes from Swiss building maintenance practice. toolsuisse AG has been producing such calculations for municipalities, schools, care homes and administrations since 2004 and is thus the market leader in Switzerland. More than 17,000 calculations have produced the standard values that are stored in easyCAFM today. The software is developed by murmy GmbH in Rotkreuz; more on this on the page About us.
From area to position
It starts with the calculated cleaning effort (see Cleaning calculation explained). This annual effort in hours is compared with the available annual working time of a full-time position. The ratio gives the staffing requirement, expressed in FTE percent.
These variables come into play
- Areas and coverings: The basis of every effort.
- Performance values: the cleanable area per hour per activity.
- Intervals: Frequency of maintenance, deep and special cleaning.
- Operating weeks: in how many weeks per year cleaning actually takes place.
- Difficulty factors: Surcharges for difficult conditions or fittings.
The five task blocks
Cleaning is only part of the work of a caretaking service. A complete workforce calculation records five blocks separately, because they are calculated differently and develop differently.
1. Routine cleaning
The regular day-to-day cleaning, calculated per area from covering, room type and interval. Added to this are deep, interim and special cleaning, which depending on the property account for around 10 percent of the Routine cleaning . The differences between these cleaning types are explained in the article Cleaning types compared.
2. Ancillary work
Waste disposal, collection points, materials management, lamps and bulbs, inspection rounds, locking service, minor repairs. Individually inconspicuous, in total quickly several hundred hours a year. This Ancillary work is usually applied as a lump sum per property size.
3. Outdoor areas and winter service
Lawn care, hedges, planting, leaves, hard surfaces, snow clearing and gritting. Outdoor areas are strongly seasonal: winter service is also event-dependent and is calculated with an expected value, not with a fixed interval.
4. Technical maintenance
Operating and checking heating, ventilation, sanitary and electrical systems, meter readings, filter changes, accompanying service visits as well as recording and tracking defects. This is where the workforce calculation links up with Maintenance planning.
5. Administration and lettings
Plans, reports, orders, arrangements with users, key management and, particularly in school facilities, looking after lettings, events and clubs. This block is regularly underestimated because it does not take place visibly on site.
The net annual working time
A full-time position is not available for 2,184 hours, even though 42 hours a week over 52 weeks gives exactly that. Holidays, public holidays and absences have to be deducted. What remains is the net annual working time, the only figure with which a workload can be calculated honestly.
| Item | Hours per year |
|---|---|
| Gross working time (42 h per week, 52 weeks) | 2'184 |
| less holidays (5 weeks) | -210 |
| less public holidays (9 days at 8.4 h) | -76 |
| less absences (around 3%) | -58 |
| Net annual working time | 1'840 |
Indicative values for orientation, as at October 2026.
Anyone who instead calculates with 2,080 or 2,184 hours arrives at a workload that is too low. The difference of around 300 hours corresponds to about 16 FTE percent for a full-time position and becomes visible in day-to-day work as overload or as a backlog in the ancillary work.
Conversion into FTE percent
The formula is simple: annual hours divided by 1,840, times 100. 920 hours give 50 FTE percent, 1,840 hours give 100 percent, 2,300 hours give 125 percent. The advantage of this presentation: hours are abstract, FTE percentages can be translated directly into employment contracts, wages and duty rosters.
Why FTE percentages instead of hours?
Hours are abstract, FTE percentages are plannable. Only in FTE percentages can the effort be linked to real employment, deployment plans and costs. This makes it visible whether a part-time position is enough or whether the need can be sensibly distributed across several people and properties.
Example: school building with 3,000 m2
A primary school building in a Swiss municipality with 3,000 m2 of cleaning area, 4,000 m2 of outdoor area and 39 school weeks. The cleaning is calculated at 2,300 hours, of which 2,091 hours are routine cleaning and around 210 hours deep, window and special cleaning. The four other task blocks are added to this.
| Task block | Hours per year | FTE percent |
|---|---|---|
| Routine cleaning incl. deep and special cleaning | 2'300 | 125 |
| Ancillary work (waste, materials, inspection rounds) | 150 | 8 |
| Outdoor areas and winter service | 350 | 19 |
| Technical maintenance | 250 | 14 |
| Administration and lettings | 200 | 11 |
| Caretaking total | 3'250 | 177 |
The result: 3,250 hours or 177 FTE percent. Cleaning alone accounts for 125 percent, the remaining blocks together for 52 percent. At internal full costs of 45 francs per hour, the cleaning results in annual costs of 103,500 francs.
Distribution across people
177 FTE percent is neither one position nor two. It has to be distributed across people so that the tasks match the qualifications and the times of day.
One possible distribution
Caretaker, 100 percent: technical maintenance, outdoor areas and winter service, ancillary work, administration and lettings, plus part of the cleaning in the special areas of gym and changing rooms.
Cleaner, 50 percent: classrooms and corridors in the main building, working in the late afternoon after lessons end.
Cleaner, 30 percent: sanitary facilities, second wing, interim cleaning over lunchtime.
A total of 180 percent against 177 calculated percent. The small reserve is deliberate: it covers weekend lettings and short-term additional work without overtime arising immediately.
The calculated requirement is the starting point for the allocation: who looks after which properties, on which days, on which route? Because the figures come from the same calculation, offer, planning and execution stay consistent. Discussions about "perceived" workload become unnecessary. The modules Workloads and allocation and Route and annual planning put this step into practice.
Cover, holidays and absences
The net annual working time already takes holidays and absences into account on the person's side. It does not, however, answer the question of who does the work in the meantime. Because the area does not take a holiday: a WC also has to be cleaned in the week when the person responsible is away.
- Use holiday windows: In school facilities, the cleaning staff's holidays can partly be placed in the school holidays. But that is when the deep cleaning is due, so the work shifts, it does not disappear.
- Reduced scope of service: For absences, it is bindingly defined which intervals remain in place and which are temporarily reduced. That is more honest than a plan that only works when the team is fully staffed.
- Relief workload: Instead of giving every person a tight workload, a small share is managed as relief across several properties. This presupposes that the workloads of all properties are calculated using the same method.
- External relief: A service provider takes over defined weeks. The basis is the same Specifications, otherwise the quality is not comparable.
Why standard values instead of empirical values
The most common argument against a calculation is: we know how long it takes. Experience is valuable, but as a basis for calculation it is unsuitable for four reasons.
- Experience describes the current state: It says how much time has been available so far, not how much the work requires. If cleaning has been underfunded for years, experience confirms exactly that backlog.
- Experience cannot be transferred: Two caretaking services in the same village arrive at different workloads for the same areas. That cannot be compared.
- Experience gets lost: When someone retires, the knowledge about the properties disappears. A documented calculation remains.
- Experience cannot be verified: Before a committee or in a tender, only what can be recalculated counts. standard values based on a broad set of data can be recalculated, a gut feeling cannot.
Standard values do not replace experience, they put it into context. If the calculated workload differs widely from today's, that is not an error in the calculation but an indication: either the recorded areas and intervals are wrong, or the equipment is unusual, or the workload really was too tight or too generous. Each of these explanations can be checked.
Presenting the result to the municipal council or school board
A workforce calculation rarely ends with the figure. Usually it has to be presented to a committee that includes no building maintenance specialists. The following approach has proven itself for this:
- Start with the method, not with the result. First explain that the figures were calculated and not estimated. Also show where the values come from. Anyone who opens with "we need 177 percent" immediately ends up discussing the number.
- Present by task block. The five blocks make it clear that this is not only about cleaning. Politically, lettings and winter service are often precisely the services that are wanted.
- Offer the comparison. A comparison with similar properties in the municipality puts the result into context. If your property is within the usual range, the discussion is usually over.
- Calculate variants instead of defending them. Show what a reduced interval actually costs and saves. Then the committee decides on the scope of service and not on your credibility.
- Disclose the basis. Area list, coverings, intervals and performance values as an annex. Being able to recalculate is more important than having to recalculate.
A cross-comparison also helps: how does this property's workload compare with that of similar properties in the municipality, measured by size and use? If one property stands out, the calculation supplies the reason, for example a gym used by clubs in the evening or a high share of sanitary areas.
The benefit
- Realistic, justified staffing needs instead of a rule of thumb.
- A clear basis for deployment, route and holiday planning.
- Fair, transparent distribution of work across the team.
- Link between effort and costs at a glance.
For municipalities and joint authorities, the workforce calculation is also the basis for looking at several properties together, see Solution for public institutions.
FAQ
Why 1,840 hours and not 2,080?
Because holidays, public holidays and absences have to be deducted. 1,840 hours is the time in which a full-time position actually works on site. Anyone who calculates with the gross time systematically sets every workload too low.
Does caretaking count towards the workforce calculation?
Yes. The Caretaking covers all five task blocks. Cleaning is usually the largest, but never the only one. A calculation that only records the cleaning produces an incomplete workload.
How do you handle several properties?
Each property is calculated individually, then the workloads are combined into positions. Only in this way do sensible employment contracts arise, because a single property often only amounts to 40 or 60 percent. The conversion for an individual position is described in the article Calculating caretaker FTE percent.
What happens if the calculation gives more than is available today?
Then a decision is due: increase the workload, reduce the scope of service or outsource parts. The calculation does not make this decision, but it makes it transparent and shows the consequences of each variant in hours and francs.
Conclusion
The workforce calculation bridges calculation and day-to-day work: square metres become plannable positions. Three things are decisive: record all five task blocks, calculate with the net annual working time of 1,840 hours and use standard values instead of empirical values. Anyone who proceeds in this way can justify every workload, compare properties and defend a result even before a committee. In easyCAFM this step happens automatically, based on the recorded areas and proven performance values.
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