Tampines Town Council Using App to Track Cleaners So They Can’t ‘Eat Snake’ Now

By
Boon Hun
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Last Updated on 2019-05-10 , 5:06 pm

More than 80% of Singaporeans stay in HDB flats. And HDB engages contractors to provide cleaning services to keep the estate clean.

If you’re lucky, you’ll get a responsible and hardworking cleaner who’ll do his job. But if you’re not, well, sucks to be you.

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You’ll never see them around and that piece of tissue you threw at the lift lobby a couple of days ago will probably still be there.

Well, guess what? These days of “invisible cleaners” might soon be over. Here’s why.

Town councils using surveillance technology on cleaners

Tampines Town Council has been receiving complaints from their residents about the cleanliness of their estates.

It got so bad that the town council decided to roll out a monitoring system for all of their cleaners.

The cleaners have to install an app on their smartphones. If they did not own one, their company will provide them with one.

Every time they report for work, they’ll have to log into their account.

Not only does the app track their every move and location, but it’ll also count as attendance for them. In other words, cannot siam liao.

Their supervisors can check on their progress via a dashboard.

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In the future, the cleaners will also have an app to make “photo reports” before and after cleaning.

The surveillance system isn’t there to find fault but to protect cleaners

So let’s say you’ve cleaned the corridor on the 9th floor, but the resident complained and say you didn’t do it.

What happens? The town council apologises and you’ll get scolded for no reason. After all, it’s your word against theirs and sad to say, the customer is always right.

With the system, the supervisors or any other management people can easily check if you’ve cleaned the specific area. And if you did, you’ll be able to defend yourself easily.

In addition, the system can also find out where the delay in work is coming from and rectify it easily.

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So, for example, the third-floor corridor is particularly hard to clean because residents have placed their items along the walkway haphazardly.

The planners will be able to see which areas are causing problems, find out why and provide a solution.

You could be given more time to clean that area, be given lesser areas to clean or get the residents to comply with the HDB corridor rules.

Tampines is a pilot and the system will be gradually rolled out in other town councils

A cleaner has expressed concern over this surveillance technology. He said that he felt like the company wanted to “control him” and track his every minute.

Tampines Town Council chairman Cheng Li Hui, however, said that cleaning the HDB estate is part of their daily job scope.

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If they’ve done their job properly, they shouldn’t be worried.

With the implementation of the new system, there was a 70 per cent drop in calls from the residents.

In addition, there was a drastic drop in feedback about corridors not swept from the residents from 254 cases to 156 cases.

Residents, meanwhile, commented that they’ve noticed the estate getting cleaner. Plus, now, at least they “see the cleaners around”.

Wait, does that mean that prior to that…the cleaners weren’t there?

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Boon Hun
Email: tan.boonhun@goodyfeed.com
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