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A daily task in care homes, boarding schools and hospitality businesses, laundry can quickly become a job that’s automatic or completed with little thought. With a large quantity of loads to clean, teams can start defaulting to the same wash cycles, cleaning products and drying methods.
Laundry myths can inform these habits and mean laundry processes aren’t as efficient as they could be. We want customers to achieve a quality clean easily on every load. To make sure you’re not operating on inefficient untruths, we’ve fact-checked some of the most common myths.
‘Clean’ means ‘disinfected’ and vice versa
In the world of laundry, the words ‘clean’ and ‘disinfected’ don’t have the same meaning. When laundry is clean, it means any stains, dirt, grime or smells have been removed in the washing process. Disinfected laundry is fully sanitised and free from germs, bacteria and mould. This means an item can be disinfected at a high temperature but still be stained or unclean, and vice versa.
This distinction is particularly important in the health and social care sectors, where infection control standards are strict. For example, under the Care Quality Commission’s (CQC) quality statements, where laundry disinfection is essential for maintaining hygiene. In contrast, the main priority for hotels and holiday parks is achieving a quality clean and dry that’s stain and crease-free.
One cycle fits all
When employees are working through a high number of loads each day, it can be tempting to wash them all on a cycle that produces a predictable result. However, choosing a cycle that matches the item’s materials, dirtiness and cleaning or disinfection requirements is more efficient and produces a higher quality outcome.
For example, if you need to disinfect wool items, then a high temperature cycle wouldn’t be suitable, as it will result in shrinkage and damage. However, an ozone wash and dry can help remove bacteria and germs without spoiling the woollens.
Similarly, adjusting the type and amount of detergents or chemicals you use can help achieve your cleaning goals. For example, if you want to clean a delicate item, you need a destainer that works at lower temperatures. If you have an item that contains grease, using an emulsifier will help you achieve effective stain removal.
Domestic and commercial machines are the same
They may look the same and have similar specifications, however, there are key differences between domestic and commercial laundry equipment. For businesses, there are a lot of benefits to opting for a commercial washing machine or dryer, including:
- Being available with a larger capacity, meaning they can handle bigger loads.
- Higher grade parts, quality manufacturing and thorough testing, meaning they last for more cycles than a domestic machine.
- Models which are WRAS-approved, making them suitable for health and social care settings.
- A wider range of programmes and features, such as auto-dosing chemical pumps, shorter cycles and high temperature washes for thermal disinfection.
- Machine warranties which protect you if some faults or issues arise with your appliance. WASHCO machines typically come with a two year parts and labour warranty.
In short, by investing in commercial machines rather than domestic ones, businesses can get more reliable, effective washing and drying performance for longer.
Equipment cleaning is more important than servicing
Although cleaning washing machines and dryers is essential to maintain laundry hygiene, it won’t ensure that your equipment is running efficiently. With so many cycles running each day, commercial machines need regular servicing to ensure they can maintain the high performance businesses need.
Proactive maintenance also helps minimise the chances of machine breakdowns and repairs. For businesses, this means loads won’t be left to build up and budgets won’t be blown by the costs of new parts or replacement machines.
The washing cycle is key to infection control
Although choosing the right washing cycle is important, it’s just one step in avoiding cross contamination. There are lots of other controls which need to be put in place to avoid the spread of bacteria or diseases, such as:
- Keeping dirty and clean laundry separate.
- Ensuring anyone handling dirty laundry wears appropriate PPE such as gloves and aprons.
- Using laundry bags to keep different individuals’ items separate from each other.
- Having visible signage and different coloured boxes or bags to make following laundry processes and standards easier for teams.
Sending linen through a pre-wash or sluice if it’s soiled, helping with disinfection.
Overfilling a machine doesn’t matter
If a load is larger than a washing machine or dryer’s maximum capacity, then the equipment can’t clean or dry the items effectively. This may result in a damaged machine or items, and is likely to produce a poor wash or dry quality. To get the result you want, you’ll need to run your load through the cleaning process again, which is a waste of water, energy and detergent.
Employees can’t improve laundry efficiency
Employees are actually the most important part of the process. If they know infection control best practices, how to choose the right cycle and chemicals for the load and understand the whole laundry process, it can hugely impact on efficiency. So to avoid wastage and get quality cleaning results from every load, educating and assisting teams is essential.
High heat tumble drying will kill bacteria
Drying on high heat will kill bacteria. However, you’d need to tumble dry at 60C for an hour to fully disinfect linens. This would destroy most items and could overheat your tumble dryer. In contrast, washing items at 65C for at least 10 minutes or 71C for three minutes minimum offers adequate thermal disinfection. A task which is much more achievable in a standard laundry process.
Ditch myths for efficient laundry processes
If you want the facts on how to make your commercial laundry processes more efficient, then we can help. Instead of dealing with myths, get expert advice on your equipment, infection control and more by contacting WASHCO’s specialists on 08000 546 546 or emailing info@washco.co.uk.