Clean the carpet in your new office after the fit-out finishes and before the furniture arrives, and clean the old one after the strip-out and before you hand back the keys. Both are one-morning jobs that fit inside a move with no impact at all, and both get skipped because a relocation has fifty moving parts and the floor is nobody's item. Getting the sequence right costs nothing. Getting it wrong means paying twice, or discovering a dilapidations claim on the day you no longer have leverage.
The new office: after the trades, before the furniture
There is exactly one window and it is narrow.
A newly fitted-out floor is not clean because it is new. It has had trades through it for weeks, and construction dust is the worst thing that can happen to carpet: fine, mineral, abrasive, and driven deep into new pile by boots, see why builders dust is different. Plaster dust in particular is alkaline and does not simply vacuum out. Grit left in a new carpet starts abrading fibre from the first day your staff walk on it, which means you have already begun shortening the life of an asset you have not used yet, see how grit wears carpet out.
So the order is: all trades finish, snag list done, builders clean, then carpet, then furniture, then people.
Cleaning before the snags are fixed means cleaning twice, because a snag repair is someone with tools walking back in. Cleaning after the furniture lands means cleaning around forty desks and never reaching the floor beneath them, which is the whole point of doing it while the floor is empty. An empty floor is the fastest, cheapest and most thorough clean available, and you will not have that access again until you leave.
The old office: after the strip-out, before handback
This is the one that costs money when it is missed.
Your lease almost certainly requires the premises returned in good condition, fair wear and tear excepted, and carpet is where that clause bites, see lease dilapidations and carpet condition. Handing back a floor you never cleaned, with five years of grit ground into the lanes, hands the landlord a characterisation you cannot argue with.
Do it after the strip-out and any making good, not before. Then photograph it, dated, same angles as whatever record you made when you moved in.
The timing point that matters: get the old floor assessed a few months before the move, not on handback day. That tells you whether you face a cleaning job or a genuine exposure while you still have time to do something about it, and it lets you negotiate from information rather than from a number the landlord produced, see what is actually defensible.
Take the baseline while the floor is empty
Ten minutes, and it protects you for the whole lease.
Photograph the new floor after cleaning and before the furniture: dated, every area, the traffic lanes, the edges, and any existing marks. Note the carpet's age if the landlord or fit-out contractor knows it, because age limits what can ever be claimed against you at exit.
This is the schedule of condition almost nobody creates, and at exit it is the difference between arguing from a photograph and arguing from memory, see how to document floor condition. You will never have a cleaner or more accessible floor to photograph than the one you are about to fill with desks.
Decisions worth making while it is empty
A relocation is the only moment you have unrestricted access, so use it.
Matting. Specify it now, at fit-out, when a recessed matwell is possible and costs you no floor space. Traffic needs six to eight steps on matting before it reaches carpet, roughly 4 to 6 metres, which is far more than the single mat you are about to inherit, see how to specify entrance matting. This is the cheapest decision in the whole move and the one with the longest payback.
Attic stock, if the floor is tiled. Buy 5 to 10 percent spare tiles now and store them on site. Dye lots vary between production runs and the installed floor starts fading from day one, so a replacement tile in four years will read as a bright patch unless you have stock from this run, see carpet tiles vs broadloom. Nobody regrets this and plenty of facilities managers inherit floors without it.
Measure it. Walk the empty floor and record the cleanable area properly, since you will never see it uncluttered again, see cleanable area versus floor area.
Set the programme. Put the cycle in the first annual budget rather than discovering the floor two years in, see making the case to finance.
What comes with you
The furniture is moving too, and this is the moment for it.
Chairs are cleaned at the desk and do not leave the building, so the practical version is doing them in the new office once they are placed rather than trying to catch them mid-move, see how office chairs are cleaned. If they are coming out of an old floor where they have been absorbing body soil for six years, arriving in a new office is the natural reset point, and the alternative is putting visibly tired chairs into a space you have just spent money on, see why chairs smell.
Rugs are the one thing that should be handled before the move rather than after. A hand-knotted piece being rolled, transported and stored is the moment it is most at risk, and it is worth knowing its condition first, see protecting a rug asset.
Access, which is where moves go wrong
Settle it in advance rather than at 19:00 on the night, see access questions in a multi-tenant building. Which lift, is it available out of hours, is the loading bay open, is there power and water on the floor yet, and does the building require contractor induction. A new fit-out with the water not yet connected is a wasted trip, and it happens more than you would think.
Drying is 2 to 6 hours, so a morning clean is dry before the removals arrive the next day, see out-of-hours scheduling.
The honest limit
Cleaning your old floor before handback improves it and does not undo five years of abrasion in the traffic lanes, see honesty about what does not come out. If the lanes are worn through, that is a dilapidations conversation rather than a cleaning one, and the useful thing we can do is tell you which parts are soil and which are wear, before the negotiation rather than during it.
Common questions
When should carpets be cleaned during an office move?
Twice, and both are one-morning jobs. In the new office: after all trades finish and the snag list is done, after the builders clean, and before the furniture arrives. In the old office: after the strip-out and any making good, and before you hand back the keys. Cleaning before the snags are fixed means cleaning twice; cleaning after the furniture lands means never reaching the floor beneath it.
Does a newly fitted-out office need its carpet cleaned?
Yes, and it is not optional if you care about the asset. A new floor is not clean because it is new: trades have been through it for weeks, and construction dust is fine, mineral, abrasive and driven deep into new pile by boots. Plaster dust is alkaline and does not simply vacuum out. Grit left in there starts abrading the fibre from the first day your staff walk on it.
Should we clean the old office carpet before handing it back?
Usually yes, and get it assessed a few months before the move rather than on handback day. Your lease almost certainly requires the premises returned in good condition, fair wear and tear excepted, and handing back an uncleaned floor lets the landlord characterise it. An early assessment tells you whether you face a cleaning job or a real dilapidations exposure while you still have time and leverage.
What should a facilities manager do while the new floor is empty?
Everything you cannot do later. Photograph the cleaned floor dated as a schedule of condition, since age and condition at handover limit what can be claimed at exit. Specify proper entrance matting while a recessed matwell is still possible. Buy 5 to 10 percent attic stock if the floor is tiled, because dye lots vary and a replacement tile in four years will not match. Measure the cleanable area, and put the cleaning cycle in the first annual budget.
To fit both cleans into a move without losing a day, contact our commercial team or see commercial carpet cleaning.