Cleaning contract template for Canadian cleaning businesses

A cleaning services contract is the document that turns a walk-through into a paying account — and the document buyers use to decide whether you are insurable, covered, and professional enough to hold keys to their building. Here is a free fill-in template (Word), what each section must say, the checklist to run before you sign, and what public-sector buyers actually demand from janitorial contractors.

Free cleaning contract template (Word download)

Our cleaning contract template (Word) is a free, fill-in working document built for Canadian commercial and institutional cleaning businesses. Page one is the contract itself: the parties, the term, the premises, a scope-of-work schedule with cleaning specifications and frequency (daily, weekly, periodic), supplies and equipment responsibility, pricing and payment terms, insurance and workers' compensation sections, access and keys, and termination. Page two is a field-by-field guide — what each section means, what to attach (site walk-through notes, a cleaning specifications schedule, certificates of insurance), and the clauses buyers and their risk departments look at first. It sits alongside our other free downloads in the templates library.

One honest note before you download: a template is a starting draft, not legal advice. For private-sector clients you can usually adapt it directly; for public-sector contracts, the buyer's own contract document governs — you will rarely supply the contract at all, because the tender documents come with the buyer's standard terms pre-written. The template's real value in public-sector bidding is that it teaches you the anatomy those standard terms follow, so you can price and staff the job accurately before you commit.

What goes in a Canadian cleaning services contract

The parties section names your legal business entity exactly as registered — the name on your insurance certificate, your WSIB/worker's compensation account, and your invoices must match it. The term states the contract length and any renewal mechanics: one year with mutual renewal is common for commercial offices, while institutional and government contracts often run multi-year terms with extension options. The premises section identifies every building, floor, or suite covered, because a contract priced for one site silently excludes the annex unless the schedule says otherwise. The scope of work is the heart of the document: a cleaning specifications schedule listing each task (washroom service, floor care, dusting, garbage and recycling, kitchen and break areas, glass and partition cleaning) with the frequency for each — daily, twice weekly, weekly, monthly, or periodic (stripping, waxing, carpet extraction, high dusting). The supplies and equipment clause settles who buys the chemicals, paper products, liners, and equipment, and whether consumables are billed through or included in the monthly price. The payment clause fixes the monthly contract price, the invoice cycle, and late-payment terms.

Three protection clauses matter more than cleaners expect. Insurance: the contract should state the commercial general liability limit you carry and that certificates of insurance are provided on request — see the buyer requirements below for the numbers institutions expect. Workers' compensation: in Ontario this means your WSIB account in good standing and a valid clearance certificate for the contract period. Access and security: keys, alarm codes, and after-hours access procedures, plus your confidentiality commitment for what your staff see inside the client's premises. A contract that skips these three is the kind a buyer's procurement office returns unread.

What public-sector and institutional buyers require

Government cleaning tenders show you exactly what a professional janitorial contract needs to contain, because federal solicitations write it out. A recent federal cleaning services RFP on CanadaBuys required commercial general liability insurance of not less than $2,000,000 per accident or occurrence and in the annual aggregate, maintained for the duration of the contract, with the buyer named as additional insured, and a certificate of insurance delivered to the contracting authority within ten days of award from an insurer licensed to operate in Canada (CanadaBuys, solicitation 21120-26-5105955). The same solicitation made three years of cleaning experience within the previous five years a mandatory criterion for institutional, commercial, or industrial facilities, required a designated supervisor with a year of team-management experience, and required WHMIS training certificates for the proposed cleaning personnel — submitted with the bid, not after.

Ontario adds the WSIB layer. Under the WSIB's clearance certificate policy, a clearance relieves the principal — your client — of liability for the premiums your cleaning company owes the WSIB during the certificate's validity period, and principals are told to obtain a clearance before work begins and for the duration of the work (WSIB operational policy manual, published September 22, 2025). Practically: your WSIB account must be registered and in good standing before you bid Ontario institutional work, and you will supply clearance numbers at contract start and renewal. Buyers at Ontario school boards and broader-public-sector organizations increasingly skip their own tendering entirely and buy through pre-qualified marketplaces — OECM's Janitorial and Cleaning Services agreements run on master agreements expiring December 9, 2030 with an option to extend up to three additional years, covering routine cleaning through specialized services like window washing, disinfection, post-construction cleanup, and healthcare cleaning. For what those contracts are worth and where to find them, our government cleaning contracts guide has the numbers.

Cleaning contract checklist before you sign or submit

Run this checklist before signing any commercial cleaning contract or submitting any tender — it catches the mistakes that cost cleaners the account later. First, scope: does the specifications schedule list every task with an explicit frequency, and have you walked the site so the schedule matches reality (a 40-minute washroom service cannot be priced as 15)? Second, parties and coverage: is your legal entity name identical on the contract, insurance certificate, and WSIB account? Third, insurance: does the required commercial general liability limit match what your policy actually carries, and can your broker issue the certificate before the start date? Fourth, workers' compensation: is your WSIB or provincial account in good standing, and for Ontario institutional work can you produce a clearance certificate number? Fifth, term and exit: do you know the notice period to terminate, what happens on renewal, and whether the buyer can reduce site frequency mid-term? Sixth, consumables: is it written who pays for paper, liners, and chemicals — the single most common dispute in janitorial contracts? When the contract came from a tender, also re-run the buyer's mandatory criteria one by one (experience years, supervisor, WHMIS certificates, insurance limits): a mandatory miss rules the bid non-responsive at any price. If you are still hunting for the accounts themselves, our guide to finding Canadian tenders maps every portal, and our Calgary and regional pages show how local markets price.

How cleaning contracts are priced and staffed

Commercial cleaning contracts are almost always priced as a fixed monthly contract price built from an estimated labour hours budget: walkthrough the site, estimate hours per visit from the specification frequencies, multiply by your loaded hourly rate (wages plus WSIB/CPP/EI/vacation plus supervision), add supplies and a margin, and divide into twelve monthly invoices. Periodic work — stripping and waxing, carpet extraction, high dusting — is either priced inside the monthly figure or invoiced separately per occurrence, and the contract should say which. Two contract clauses protect your margin: a scope-change clause (extra tasks or added sites are change orders, not favours) and a payment-terms clause with a stated invoice cycle and interest on late payment. Staffing-wise, buyers increasingly demand continuity — the same crew on the same nights — and institutional tenders may require named personnel with WHMIS certification, so keep training records current for every cleaner you could put on a bid. When you are assembling the bid documents themselves, our proposal template and the WSIB premium calculator cover the cost side for Ontario employers.

Frequently asked questions

Is there a free cleaning contract template for Canada?

Yes — our cleaning contract template (Word) is a free fill-in download: the full contract (parties, term, scope-of-work schedule with frequencies, supplies, payment, insurance, workers' compensation, access, termination) on page one and a field-by-field guide on page two. It is drafted for Canadian commercial and institutional cleaning, with the insurance and WSIB sections Canadian buyers expect. Use it as your working draft for private and commercial clients; for public-sector tenders, expect the buyer's own contract to govern and use the template to understand and price it.

What should be included in a cleaning services contract?

Seven sections do the work: parties (legal names matching your insurance and WSIB accounts), term and renewal, premises covered, scope of work as a specifications schedule with a frequency for every task, supplies and equipment responsibility, the monthly contract price and payment terms, and termination notice. Three protection clauses belong in every professional version: commercial general liability insurance stated with its limit, workers' compensation coverage with clearance-certificate mechanics in Ontario, and access/security terms covering keys, alarms, and confidentiality. Attach the site walk-through notes and the cleaning specifications schedule as schedules — a scope buried in prose is the number-one source of contract disputes in janitorial work.

What insurance does a cleaning contractor need for government contracts?

Commercial general liability is the core requirement. Federal cleaning solicitations on CanadaBuys commonly require not less than $2,000,000 per occurrence and in the annual aggregate, maintained for the contract duration, with the buyer named as additional insured and a certificate of insurance delivered shortly after award from an insurer licensed in Canada — a recent Correctional Service Canada cleaning RFP states exactly that. Institutional buyers (school boards, universities, hospitals) typically sit in the same range, and some add employee dishonesty or fidelity coverage for staff working with keys. Ask your broker for a CGL certificate at the $2M–$5M level before bidding public-sector work; it is a standard commercial product for cleaning businesses.

Do cleaning contractors need WSIB coverage in Ontario?

If you have workers, you are required to register with the WSIB and report premiums, and your institutional clients will check. Under the WSIB's clearance certificate policy, a client (the principal) obtains a clearance certificate from you before work begins and for the duration of the contract, because the clearance relieves the principal of liability for any premiums your company owes during the certificate's validity period. A cleaning company without a WSIB account in good standing is effectively unsellable to Ontario schools, universities, and broader-public-sector buyers — and OECM's pre-qualified marketplace agreements require suppliers to hold exactly this coverage. Other provinces run parallel workers' compensation boards with the same buyer expectation.

How long do government cleaning contracts run?

Longer than commercial work — that is why they are worth winning. Federal janitorial solicitations commonly state a contract duration around 24 months; OECM's Ontario Janitorial and Cleaning Services master agreements expire December 9, 2030 with an option to extend up to three additional years, and customers issue their own contracts against those masters for multi-year terms. The flip side is competition intensity: multi-year institutional contracts re-tender infrequently, so each competition draws every serious operator in the region. Winning once, though, typically means revenue you can staff a crew against for years — which is why the experience documentation buyers demand (three years of references, WHMIS certificates) is worth assembling early, even before your first tender.

How do I get cleaning contracts with the government?

Three doors, in order of effort. First, register and monitor the portals: CanadaBuys federally, provincial portals (Ontario's Tenders Portal, BC Bid, Saskatchewan Tenders, Alberta purchasing), and municipal sites — our tender-finding guide lists them all, and our government cleaning contracts guide shows the actual contract values being awarded. Second, get on the pre-qualified lists: Ontario BPS buyers buy janitorial services through OECM's marketplace, so becoming an awarded supplier partner puts you in front of every education and public-sector customer without individual tenders. Third, watch where cleaning contracts cluster — school boards, universities, health authorities, and municipal facility portfolios — and register with their purchasing arms directly. Start the insurance, WSIB, and WHMIS paperwork now; every one of those doors asks for it at qualification, not after you win.