One of Britain’s leading domestic services companies is advising holidaymakers that they might need to take their own sheets and pillowcases if they want to be 100% certain of staying safe, amid fears of a second wave of the pandemic.

The advice, from Fantastic Services, comes as bookings with UK-based holiday letting companies were given another boost last week following the decision to impose quarantine on holidaymakers returning from Spain. Holiday letting agents have also noticed increased scrutiny when it comes to their cleaning services and the majority have implemented new policies to ensure hygiene and cleanliness are maintained at all times.

One of the UK’s largest domestic services companies, Fantastic Services, is working alongside letting companies to ensure their properties hit the mark when it comes to hygiene and have identified the top five typically dirtiest areas that customers should be on the lookout for in a holiday home:

Bed sheets and mattresses

According to The Sleep Council, the average bed contains 10,000 dust mites. It’s one of the notoriously harder spots to clean, but techniques such as hoovering and airing the mattresses are simple methods that solve the dilemma. If you want to go the extra mile during this time, bring your own bed linen.

The kitchen sink and utensils

The kitchen sink is often the dirtiest place in any kitchen, so it’s always worth giving it a clean with anti-bacterial spray at the beginning, middle and end of the day. Also, even if the utensils look sparkling clean, we would also encourage everyone to put them in a dishwasher or give them a thorough clean when you arrive for your own piece of mind.

Kitchen towels

A kitchen towel may not be your first thought when it comes to the dirtiest area of your home, but they are very easily contaminated because we use them for so many things – drying our hands, cleaning up spillages and holding hot pans to name a few. These will need to be cleaned even more regularly during the pandemic, so when you arrive at the holiday home make sure you have a fresh towel each day.

Touchpoints

Touchpoints, such as light switches and knobs, throughout a property are one of the easiest ways for the virus to spread if we touch our face and then use a door handle or TV remote. The virus can survive on surfaces for a number of hours. Make sure to anti-bac these areas regularly and have hand sanitiser readily accessible for all household members. It’s ideal to use a new wipe for every spot instead of reusing the same one.

The bathroom

It’s an obvious one, but as the place where you wash bacteria and germs off your own body, it’s an easy place for a virus to spread. Luckily, Covid-19 is less likely to live here because soap and water are able to wash it away, but its still essential to make sure this room has been thoroughly cleaned before arrival and towels should be replaced regularly