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Scheduling
Applications of Aprehend should be applied in each room on a quarterly schedule. The hotel can be divided in to 4 sections with all rooms in one section being treated each month. Alternatively, schedule treatments to include all rooms over a number of days until complete. If monthly services for other pests are part of the contract, schedule pro-active room service to make most economic use of technician time and travel.
Work with hotel management to agree how and when rooms will be allocated for treatment, e.g. by floor or wing, ensuring that rooms scheduled for treatment are either vacated by overnight guests on the day the tech conducts service or otherwise unoccupied. Keep accurate records to ensure that all rooms receive service, and re-application scheduled at 3-month intervals.
Room preparation
Rooms do not need to be prepped specifically for treatment, but must not be currently occupied by overnight guests. Ideally, recently vacated rooms should be treated prior to being made up by housekeeping staff. Technicians can treat fully made-up rooms, but staff will need to correct minor disruptions to room staging, due to technicians moving beds away from walls etc. during application. In either case, staff and clients should not access the treated room for 4 hours after treatment. Housekeeping should be instructed not to remove bed skirts for laundering after application. Since hotels vary in their schedule for changing bed skirts, inform housekeeping that bed skirts should only be changed (if necessary) just prior to Aprehend application.
Application of Aprehend
The bed(s)
Aprehend should be applied as 2” barriers around the perimeter of the box spring and bed skirt. Pull the bed(s) away from the wall and apply a barrier around the side perimeter of the box spring by lifting the bed skirt to gain access. Barrier placement should be along the lower edge of the box spring. Apply a second barrier around the top perimeter of the bed skirt, just below the mattress. If the bed skirt has pleats at the corners of the bed, apply Aprehend into the inner pleats on all four corners as these are favored harborage sits for introduced bed bugs.
Headboard(s)
If the headboard is removable from the wall, lift it off the support bracket and apply an Aprehend barrier around the rear perimeter of the headboard and replace it. If the headboard is not easily removed from the wall, apply the Aprehend barrier around the edge of the headboard to ensure that bed bugs attempting to harbor behind the headboard will contact the spray residue. Avoid application of Aprehend to wallpaper surfaces as staining could occur, particularly after repeated applications.
Baseboards
Apply Aprehend along top of the baseboard/wall interface behind the head end of the bed. It is not necessary to treat the baseboards around the entire room.
Pricing
Room servicing is more efficient if two technicians work together. In most cases, two technicians can service a hotel room with two queen beds in under 5 minutes. Initial estimates for the cost of treatment should assume 10 ‘person minutes’ per room per treatment. The quantity of Aprehend required per room will vary according to room type, but an estimate of 1 fl oz per queen bed is a reasonable starting point.
- Estimated Cost of annual proactive service can be calculated as follows:
- Calculate the cost of 1 oz Aprehend (e.g. $130/16=$8.13) Note. Price of Aprehend® decreases if purchased in bulk. Total number of rooms in hotel (e.g. 100)
- Technician hourly charge out rate (e.g. $100/hr) include profit margin here or add elsewhere.
- Total number of beds in hotel = number of kings + queens + double queens (e.g. 150 beds)
Example:
[(100 rooms) * ($100 per hour/6 rooms per hour)] + (150 beds* $8.13 Aprehend) * 4 services per year = $11,544.67 per annum
Warranty
In offering the contract service above, a warranty may be offered such that any bed bug sightings reported to management will be investigated by a trained tech within 24 or 48 hrs. Inspection will be conducted and observations reported back to the management. Techs should be trained to distinguish between an introduction (i.e. a recently introduced bed bug from a guest) vs establishment of an early infestation. Introductions cannot be avoided, but Aprehend will prevent the establishment of an infestation. Providing the room received pro-active application of Aprehend within the past 3 months, active infestation is highly unlikely. Either way, all visible bed bugs should be removed and placed in a Ziplock bag for verification of contact with Aprehend (click here for Ziplock Bag Test Instructions) and a top up treatment with Aprehend should be performed to ensure continuing protection for that room.
Hotels taking up the annual pro-active service will not be charged for any additional bed bug servicing, this gives management a fixed and predictable cost for bed bug management, removing the financial uncertainty of a reactive treatments. Further, the service contract will help provide protection from litigation since the management can demonstrate they have done everything possible to protect guests from bed bug encounters.
Optional Extras
Offer training to housekeeping staff on how to check for and identify bed bugs.
Provide best practice protocols for housekeeping to prevent spread of bed bugs in laundry carts.
See how other PMPs have used Aprehend in a variety of difficult situations in these Case Studies and suggested prep steps and proper equipment usage with these Training Videos .
Or give us a call at (800) 891-8610 and we can discuss how to integrate Aprehend into your current protocol, reduce call-backs, and eliminate the most difficult bed bug infestations.