Find Cleaning and Facilities Subcontractors in Australia

Home » Find Subcontractors » Cleaning and facilities management

Early access open

Cleaning is the sector where contractor classification is scrutinised most closely in Australia, because the arrangements have historically been used to move labour costs rather than to engage genuine businesses. That history shapes how these engagements should be set up.

This page covers what gets subcontracted in this sector, the credentials worth confirming, and how a job runs on Workforce Marketplace. Early access is open.

What gets subcontracted

The work most often subcontracted covers:

Commercial and office cleaning on a scheduled contract
Strata and common area cleaning
Industrial and site cleaning, including post-construction cleans
Specialist cleaning: high pressure, facade, carpet and hard floor
Waste management and bin room servicing
Grounds maintenance, landscaping and external upkeep
Integrated facilities management across a portfolio

Credentials that matter here

Cleaning itself is not licensed, so the confirmations that matter are about legitimacy and the specific hazards:

An active ABN and genuine business indicia: own equipment, own insurance, multiple clients, the ability to subcontract or substitute
Public liability insurance, and workers compensation where the contractor has staff of their own
Working at Heights and IRATA rope access for facade and external work
Confined Space Entry for tank, pit and plant room cleaning
Working Safely with Asbestos Awareness and Silica Dust Awareness for site and post-construction cleans
Pest Management Technician Licence through the state environment authority where pest control is bundled in
Security Licence where cleaners hold keys and alarm codes for unattended premises

This is the sector where the contractor-versus-employee test matters most. An individual cleaner working set hours at your premises with your equipment and no other clients is very likely an employee whatever the paperwork says, and the liability for getting that wrong sits with you. Engage businesses, not people.

What to confirm before work starts

An active ABN. Where a supplier does not quote one, you are generally required to withhold 47 per cent of the payment and remit it to the ATO. Their GST registration also tells you whether the price should carry it.

That the credential is held by the entity you are contracting with. A person can hold a qualification while the business you are paying holds nothing. Check the name on the document against the name on the invoice.

Insurance appropriate to the scope. Public liability is the common one. Depending on the work you may also need professional indemnity, and workers compensation if they carry their own staff.

That the engagement is genuinely a contract for services. Since the Fair Work amendments the test looks at the real substance of the relationship rather than the label on the paperwork, and getting it wrong creates back-pay, superannuation and payroll tax exposure. Contractor vs employee in Australia sets out how it now works.

Writing a scope that gets comparable quotes

Cleaning contracts go wrong on specification. State the scope room by room or area by area with frequencies, who supplies consumables and equipment, what the periodic works are and whether they are included or extra, how performance is measured and what happens on a failed audit, what access and security arrangements apply, and what the notice period is on both sides.

How it works on Workforce Marketplace

Post the scope with the payment structure it actually uses, whether that is fixed price, hourly, daily, quoted or split into milestones for staged work. Subcontractors apply, and you compare them side by side rather than chasing callbacks.

Every account is ABN-verified at sign-up. Beyond that, subcontractors can submit licences, certifications and insurance for verification, which we review rather than grant automatically. Their profile shows the status against each credential without showing the document, the licence number or the ABN. Verification is opt-in, so a profile may hold credentials that have not been submitted, and it reflects the document as at the date it was reviewed rather than standing indefinitely.

Applying for work costs nothing and there are no leads to buy. Payment runs through Stripe, and Workforce Marketplace never stores your card or bank details.