A turnover handover checklist for your own cleaning team

A turnover is a handover twice over: the last guest hands the place to your cleaner, and your cleaner hands it to the next guest. Most arguments about a turnover happen because one of those handovers left no record. A guest says the wine glass was already broken, a cleaner says the towels were never delivered, and there's nothing to settle it with.

This is the checklist we'd give a team doing turnovers across several properties. Some of it ProperLink enforces. The rest is house rules, and it's marked as such.

Before the day

Set each property up once, with its address and how to get in: lockbox location and code, building door, lift, alarm. Those are stored with the property, not in a message. The assigned cleaner can see them from two hours before the start time until the job is done, and each time they're viewed, it's recorded. Once saved, they aren't shown back in the workspace, so keep your own record of them.

For each turnover, write in the job's notes what the cleaner needs on site: where the linen and consumables are kept, the balcony door that sticks, a guest who asked for a cot. Your cleaner sees the notes once they've checked in at the property.

Anything that changes when the job has to be finished, like an early check-in, needs to reach the cleaner before they set off. If you know when you create the turnover, set the finish-by time to match. If it changes after that, message the cleaner: the finish-by time stays as it was created, so judge the job against what you told them.

Parking is the one thing they need before they get there, and the notes only open once they arrive. Put it in the property's entry instructions instead, which the cleaner sees along with the codes.

On arrival

Check in at the property. ProperLink enforces this one: the GPS check-in only works within 200 metres of the address, and it opens an hour before the start time.

Photograph the place as the last guest left it, before touching anything. ProperLink needs at least one arrival photo before the cleaner can start. As a house rule, ask for more:

• the kitchen bench and sink
• each bathroom
• each bed, unmade
• anything damaged, missing or left behind, close up

This is the set that settles "was it already like that?" a week later. It's also the one that gets skipped when a cleaner is running late, which is why the first one is required.

Before marking it done

Photograph the finished job. ProperLink needs at least one after photo before the job can be marked done. The useful set mirrors the arrival photos: the same rooms, from roughly the same spot, so the before and after line up.

Leave a completion note (a house rule) for anything you'll need to act on:

• consumables running low
• damage found, and where it's photographed
• items left behind by the guest
• anything that couldn't be finished, and why

A note that says "all good" is fine too. What matters is that there's a note when it isn't.

Before you approve

When the job is marked done, whoever created the turnover is notified. Before approving it, as a house rule:

• look at the after photos against the arrival photos
• read the completion note and deal with anything in it
• check the times: when they checked in, and when it was marked done, against the finish-by time if you set one, or the time you gave the cleaner if it changed

Approving closes the turnover. If something's wrong, sort it out with your cleaner first.

Keep it short enough to be used

A checklist that takes longer than the clean won't be followed. Start with the arrival and after photos and the completion note, because those are the records you'll actually go back to. Add the rest when a property gives you a reason to.

For how the jobs themselves are set up and assigned, see coordinating turnovers across multiple short-stay properties. To set ProperLink up for your team, email hello@properlink.ai.