How much does insurance cost for a cleaning business?

What insurers publish for cleaners

ERGO NEXT is the only insurer in our data that breaks out cleaning businesses. It reports averages across its own active U.S. customers, so the figures reflect small operators who buy online. The workers’ comp page carries a disclosure that mentions commercial property customers, which looks like a copy error on NEXT’s part, so read the comp average with that caveat.

Insurer- and broker-reported figures from each company’s own customers, as published on its website; not a random sample of all businesses. Figures are rounded as published.

Annualized, the NEXT averages come to $720 for house-cleaner GL, $900 for janitorial GL and $1,392 for cleaning workers’ comp (our calculation, monthly figure times 12). The janitorial GL average is 25% above the house-cleaner average. NEXT does not say why the two differ. Neither average includes a bond, crime coverage or bailee’s coverage, and none of the sources we checked publishes a price for those.

Nothing here tells you what your own quote should be. NEXT’s pages do not say how many employees its customers have, or what limits they bought.

Workers’ comp: the class sets the price

Comp is rated per $100 of payroll in Ohio and Wyoming and per hour worked in Washington. Classes for cleaning work differ a lot, and the difference is mostly about height and customer type.

Base rates set by the state fund before experience modification. Ohio and Wyoming charge per $100 of payroll; Washington charges per hour worked, and part is withheld from wages. Other states’ insurers file their own rates; see where rates are published.

Ohio, a monopolistic state, sells comp only through its Bureau of Workers’ Compensation. Its schedule lists three cleaning classes⁠¹:

• 0917, residential cleaning by contractor, inside: $1.0477 per $100 of payroll.
• 9014, janitorial services by contractors, no window cleaning above ground level, and drivers: $1.3559.
• 9170, janitorial services including window cleaning above ground level, and drivers: $4.8702.

Class 9170 costs 3.6 times class 9014 (our calculation: 4.8702 divided by 1.3559). A janitorial company that adds exterior window work on lifts or ladders above ground level pays that multiple on the payroll the bureau assigns to the higher class, not just on the window crew’s hours. Ask which class the window crew’s payroll lands in and how the bureau treats employees who do both.

Washington’s class 6602, janitorial services and pest control, is $1.6799 per hour worked in 2026⁠². The class is one rate, but the administrative code divides it into subclasses for reporting: 6602-02 for contract window washing not done with a janitorial service, 6602-03 for commercial or combined commercial and residential janitorial cleaning, and 6602-04 for residential janitorial cleaning⁠³. A company doing both commercial and residential work reports under 6602-03. Carpet cleaning appears as its own Washington class, 2202, at $2.1446 per hour⁠². About $0.36515 of the 6602 rate is the employees’ share, and the rest falls on the employer⁠².

Wyoming’s schedule is built on NAICS codes and does not list the 561720 janitorial services code. The nearest entry is 561000, Administrative and Support Services, at $3.20 per $100 of payroll for 2026⁠⁴. Wyoming’s clerical code (000010) is $0.31 per $100⁠⁴, so the 561000 rate is about 10 times the office rate (our calculation). Treat 561000 as the nearest published rate, not as a confirmed classification of a cleaning firm.

The rate tables above are base rates before experience rating and discounts, so a given employer’s premium will differ.

A worked comparison

Both examples are our calculation on stated assumptions, before experience rating or discounts.

• Ohio: a $200,000 annual payroll in class 9014 produces a base premium of $2,711.80 (200,000 ÷ 100 × $1.3559). The same payroll in class 9170 would produce $9,740.40.
• Washington: five full-time cleaners at 1,000 hours each over a quarter is 5,000 hours. At $1.6799 per hour the quarter’s premium is $8,399.50, of which the employees’ deduction is $1,825.75 (5,000 × $0.36515), leaving $6,573.75 for the employer.

Comparing the two states directly is misleading, because Ohio charges on payroll and Washington on hours worked.

The sector benchmark

The Bureau of Labor Statistics does not publish a cleaning-only figure. In June 2026, private employers spent an average of $0.43 per hour worked on workers’ comp across all industries⁠⁵. The broad groups containing cleaning work in the same survey are professional and business services ($0.36) and service occupations ($0.34)⁠⁵. Cleaning’s own rate is hidden inside those averages.

Average employer cost per employee hour worked for workers' compensation and for health insurance, averaged across all workers in the group, plus workers' compensation as a percent of total compensation. Group averages mix high- and low-risk jobs, so they are not a premium rate for any single business. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), National Compensation Survey, June 2026 (2026 Q2), private industry workers, released 9 Sep 2026.

Liability and the care, custody or control gap

A commercial general liability policy pays for bodily injury and property damage you cause to others. For a cleaner, the common claim is damage inside a client’s premises: a floor stripped with the wrong chemical, a flooded room, a broken fixture. Whether the policy answers for damage to property in the cleaner’s own care depends on the exclusions in your specific policy, which we have not reviewed.

Two kinds of loss differ here. If a cleaner’s vacuum trips a client and the client is hurt, that is bodily injury, which general liability is built for. Damage to a client’s property while it is in the cleaner’s care, such as a scorched sofa, is the gap the regulator’s bailee product addresses. Read your own policy’s damage-to-property exclusions for both personal property and the building.

The District of Columbia’s insurance regulator lists the product built for this gap. Bailee’s customers insurance covers the legal liability for damage to or destruction of a bailor’s property while in a bailee’s care, and the fact sheet names a cleaning or janitorial provider as an example of a bailee⁠⁸. The same fact sheet lists a business owner’s policy as bundling general liability, property and business income coverage, and inland marine for equipment that moves between sites, such as floor machines⁠⁸. See business owner’s policy for what a bundle includes and excludes.

Bonds, employee dishonesty and client trust

The District’s regulator describes a janitorial bond as a three-party contract between the cleaning company (principal), the entity requiring the bond (obligee) and the surety. It says janitorial service bonds protect your clients if one or more employees steal from your company or from the property where they work⁠⁸. The same document separates employee crime from crime by others: employee crimes are addressed through “employee dishonesty” coverage or a fidelity bond, and crimes by others, such as forgery, burglary, robbery or theft, can fall under a commercial crime policy⁠⁸.

Two points affect cost and contracts:

1. The beneficiary differs

   A first-party employee dishonesty policy reimburses your own loss. A bond or a third-party endorsement pays the client whose property was taken. Commercial clients that ask for a “bonded” contractor are asking about the second. The sources we checked do not describe each carrier’s form, so read the insuring agreement for whose property is covered and whether the employee must be identified or convicted.

2. No price is published

   Neither NEXT nor the regulator publishes a bond or crime premium for cleaners. A bond is a surety product rather than a payroll-rated policy. See surety bonds.

State rules also matter. The sources we checked did not establish a statewide license or insurance minimum for general cleaning services, and the DC fact sheet says a bond may be needed when a license or permit is required by federal, state or local government⁠⁸. Contracts with property managers and public agencies are the more common source of required limits, and those requirements are in the contract, not in the statute. Check your city and county for permits. We have not verified requirements for specific states.

Building a budget

There is no honest single total for a cleaning company. Build it from the inputs that are published:

1. Comp first

   Pull your class and rate from the state schedule (Ohio, Washington and Wyoming are published above; other states use their rating bureau) and multiply by payroll or hours (examples above). Split window or exterior work into its own class if the state does.

2. GL as a separate quote

   Use NEXT’s $60 and $75 a month as a reference point for a small operator, not for a crew with commercial contracts.

3. Ask for the gap coverages by name

   Bailee’s customers, employee dishonesty or a janitorial bond, and inland marine for equipment are priced separately and may be endorsements on a package.

4. Check the audit

   If you add window work or move from residential to commercial customers, the class the insurer assigns to your payroll can change. See premium audits.

For the class-code system itself, see workers’ comp class codes. If your crew also does repairs, handyman businesses covers how a mixed-service firm is rated.

Sources

1. 1
   Ohio Bureau of Workers' Compensation / Ohio Administrative Code, OAC 4123-17-06, Appendix A: base rates effective July 1, 2026 (private employers) Checked 13 Oct 2026 · Back to text ↑
2. 2
   Washington Department of Labor & Industries, Rates for workers' compensation, 2026 Checked 13 Oct 2026 · Back to text ↑
3. 3
   Washington State Legislature / Department of Labor & Industries, WAC 296-17A-6602, Classification 6602: janitorial services and pest control Checked 13 Oct 2026 · Back to text ↑
4. 4
   Wyoming Department of Workforce Services, State of Wyoming Workers' Compensation 2026 Industry Base Rates by Classification Checked 13 Oct 2026 · Back to text ↑
5. 5
   U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026 (released Sept. 9, 2026) Checked 13 Oct 2026 · Back to text ↑
6. 6
   ERGO NEXT, General liability insurance cost, average cost per month by profession (data updated April 2026) Checked 13 Oct 2026 · Back to text ↑
7. 7
   ERGO NEXT, Workers' compensation insurance cost, average cost per month by profession (data updated April 2026) Checked 13 Oct 2026 · Back to text ↑
8. 8
   District of Columbia Department of Insurance, Securities and Banking, Insurance coverage for a cleaning business (2024 Business Insurance Fact Sheet) Checked 13 Oct 2026 · Back to text ↑

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