Ask any office manager which room causes the most complaints and the answer is almost always the kitchen. It's shared by everyone, cleaned by no one in particular, and it's the one place in the building where food, water and dozens of hands all meet.
The surfaces that need doing every day
Worktops, the sink and taps, the hob or microwave, the fridge handle and the kettle are all touched many times a day, so they get wiped and sanitised at every visit. Tables are cleared and cleaned, bins are emptied, and the floor is mopped rather than just swept, because a dry sweep moves crumbs around without lifting the film underneath.
A good clean also deals with the things people don't think of as dirty: coffee machine buttons, the tap lever, the door handle in and out, the top of the dishwasher.
The spots that quietly get missed
Fridge shelves and seals, the inside of the microwave, the underside of the kettle and the gap behind the sink are where smells start. They don't need attention every day, but they do need a place on a rota — weekly for the fridge and microwave, monthly for the deeper spots.
A cloth that goes from the sink to the table to the fridge handle spreads more than it removes. Colour-coded cloths keep the food-area kit separate from everything else; we cover how that works in our guide to colour-coded cleaning cloths.
What to agree with whoever cleans your office
Kitchens go wrong when nobody is sure whose job something is. It helps to agree two things in writing: what the cleaners do every visit, and what staff are expected to do themselves (rinsing mugs, clearing the fridge on Fridays). Most disputes disappear once that list exists.
If the kitchen is used heavily — a large team, a lunch-time rush — it usually earns an extra visit or a second pass in the schedule. That's part of what we look at on a walkthrough, and it's covered in our office cleaning service and our dedicated kitchen and pantry cleaning.
A clean-looking kitchen and a hygienic one are two different things — the difference is in the handles, the cloths and the fridge.
The short answer
Daily: surfaces, sink, appliances' touch points, bins and floors. Weekly: fridge and microwave. Monthly: the deep spots. Write it down, share it with your cleaner, and the kitchen stops being the room everyone complains about.