What is a janitorial bond?
A janitorial bond is a promise, backed by a surety company, that your clients will be paid back if one of your employees steals from them while working in their home or building. Cleaning companies buy it so clients can hand over keys and alarm codes with less worry.
Like any surety bond, it involves three parties. The District of Columbia’s insurance regulator describes them as the principal (the cleaning company), the obligee (whoever requires the bond) and the surety (the company that issues it), and notes that janitorial bonds protect clients when employees steal from the property where they work (DC Department of Insurance, Securities and Banking fact sheet).
| Party | Who it is in a cleaning business | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Principal | Your cleaning business | Buys the bond and promises its employees will not steal |
| Obligee | Your client, or a property manager or building that requires the bond | Can file a claim if an employee steals from them |
| Surety | The bonding company | Investigates and pays valid claims, up to the bond amount, then seeks repayment from you |
You will see it sold under several names: janitorial bond, janitorial service bond, business service bond, theft bond, or third-party fidelity bond. Surety Bonds Direct, for example, says these bonds are sometimes called fidelity bonds or theft bonds (Surety Bonds Direct). The name matters less than the wording, which is what the rest of this guide helps you read.
Is a janitorial bond required?
For most residential cleaners, no law requires one. The usual reason to buy is that clients ask, especially commercial clients, property managers and homeowners who will not be home during the clean. The DC fact sheet adds that a bond may be needed when a federal, state or local license or permit requires one, so check with your city or county when you register the business. Our guide to cleaning business licenses covers registration.
What does a janitorial bond cover, and what does it leave out?
A janitorial bond covers theft of a client’s money or property by your employees while they work at the client’s location. It does not cover accidents, broken items, injuries, or theft from your own business.
Insureon’s janitorial bond page is direct about the limit: the bond does not cover damage to a client’s property, only theft (Insureon: janitorial bonds). Merchants Bonding, a surety that writes a janitorial theft bond, lists two more exclusions worth knowing: it does not cover employees who committed previous fraudulent or dishonest acts, and it does not cover an employee stealing from the employer (Merchants Bonding: Theft Guard Janitorial).
| Situation | Janitorial bond? | What usually responds instead |
|---|---|---|
| Your employee takes cash from a client’s drawer and is convicted | Yes, up to the bond amount | Not applicable |
| A cleaner drops and breaks a client’s lamp | No | General liability, subject to its care, custody or control wording |
| A client slips on a wet floor | No | General liability |
| An employee steals your vacuum or the business’s cash | No | First-party employee dishonesty or crime coverage |
| A ring goes missing and nobody can say who took it | Usually not, if the bond has a conviction clause | Often nothing; see the missing-item steps below |
The conviction clause
Many janitorial bonds only pay after the employee is convicted of the theft in court. Merchants Bonding says its janitorial bond has a conviction clause, meaning the employee must be convicted before there can be a claim, and notes that this varies by state. Surety Bonds Direct says it only sells janitorial bonds with conviction clauses (Surety Bonds Direct guide).
That protects your cleaners from unproven accusations, but it also means a client with a missing necklace and no police case usually gets nothing from the bond. Be honest with clients about this rather than implying that “bonded” means every loss is paid.
Blanket coverage, applied per employee
Janitorial bonds are usually written on a blanket basis: they cover all your employees without naming each one. Merchants describes its bond as blanket position coverage, with the limit applied separately to each employee. Pricing is often based on how many people are covered, so tell the surety when your headcount grows.
Worked example: a claim from start to finish
Hypothetical: you carry a $10,000 bond. A client reports a $3,000 watch missing, the police investigate, and your employee is convicted of the theft. The client files a claim, the surety confirms it and pays the client $3,000. The surety then asks your business to repay the $3,000, as Surety Bonds Direct explains the principal is responsible for. The client is made whole quickly and you pay the cost, much like a guaranteed loan.
Janitorial bond or insurance: which protects whom?
A janitorial bond protects your clients from employee theft. Insurance protects your business from accidents, lawsuits and its own losses. Most cleaning businesses that have employees end up with both.
The DC fact sheet separates the main coverages a cleaning business might consider. Crimes by your own employees against your business are handled by employee dishonesty coverage or a fidelity bond, crimes by outsiders by commercial crime insurance, and damage to a client’s property while it is in your care by bailee’s customers insurance.
| Coverage | Who it protects | Typical cleaning claim |
|---|---|---|
| Janitorial bond (third-party) | Your client | Employee steals jewelry from a home |
| General liability | Your business, against claims by others | Bucket leaks and stains a ceiling; client trips over a cord |
| Employee dishonesty or first-party fidelity | Your business | Office manager pockets client payments |
| Bailee’s customers | Your client’s property in your care | Rug you took off site for cleaning is damaged |
| Workers’ compensation | Your employees | Cleaner hurts their back moving furniture |
Our guide to cleaning business insurance covers general liability, workers’ compensation and auto in detail, with median costs for each policy.
Other bonds you might hear about
If you bid on larger commercial or government cleaning contracts, you may be asked for bid, performance or payment bonds. These guarantee that you will sign the contract, finish it and pay suppliers, not that your staff will not steal. The SBA guarantees bid, performance and payment bonds for eligible small businesses on contracts up to $9 million (non-federal) or $14 million (federal), and charges a fee of 0.6% of the contract price on performance and payment bond guarantees (SBA: surety bonds). A house cleaning business rarely needs these.
How much does a janitorial bond cost?
Most small cleaning businesses pay roughly $100 to $350 a year for a janitorial bond. Insureon reports that cleaning businesses paid an average of $9 a month, or $112 a year, for one.
- Insureon: $9 a month ($112 a year) on average for cleaning businesses that bought through it (Insureon, page updated August 28, 2026).
- Surety Bonds Direct: about $100 to $350 for five employees, depending on the bond amount, past claims and the number of employees (Surety Bonds Direct guide).
What changes the price
- Bond amount. A $50,000 bond costs more than a $5,000 one, though not ten times more.
- Number of people covered. Many sureties price by headcount bands, such as up to 5, up to 10 or up to 25 people.
- Claims history. A past claim against your bond raises the price, or makes it harder to get one.
- Term. Some sureties sell one-year and three-year terms. Surety Bonds Direct offers both (Surety Bonds Direct).
Worked example: what a bond adds to each visit
Assume a $150 yearly bond and 40 recurring clients cleaned every two weeks. That is 40 × 26 = 1,040 visits a year, so the bond costs about $0.14 per visit. Even a bond several times that price is a small line in your overhead. Build it into your prices with the house cleaning price calculator, which includes overhead in every quote.
Because small bonds are low risk for the surety, many are issued quickly. Surety Bonds Direct says it sells janitorial bonds up to $250,000 without a credit check to businesses with 25 or fewer employees. Larger bonds, or businesses with claims, may need underwriting.
How big a bond do you need?
Buy the amount your clients or contracts require. If nobody sets a number, pick an amount that would cover a realistic theft in the kind of homes you clean, often $10,000 to $25,000 for residential work.
Bond amounts commonly range from $5,000 to $100,000. Merchants Bonding offers $5,000 to $100,000. Surety Bonds Direct suggests $10,000 to $25,000 for residential cleaning and at least $25,000 for commercial work, adding that most commercial buyers choose $50,000.
A quick way to choose
- Check every contract and client request. Property managers and commercial clients often write a minimum into the agreement. That number wins.
- Think about the homes. What could plausibly walk out of a typical home you clean: cash, jewelry, a laptop, prescription medicine? In higher-value homes, a larger bond is easy to justify.
- Remember the limit applies per employee. On a blanket bond with the limit applied to each employee, as Merchants describes, the amount is what one dishonest employee’s theft can be paid up to.
- Compare the price step. Get quotes at two amounts. When the jump from $10,000 to $25,000 costs a few dollars a month, the larger bond usually reads better on a contract and a quote.
How to get bonded for a cleaning business, step by step
To get bonded, count the people the bond must cover, choose an amount, get quotes from a surety agency or your insurance agent, read the bond wording, then buy it and keep the bond document ready for clients. Small bonds can often be bought online the same day.
- Set up the business first. The bond is issued to your legal business name, so register it before you apply. If you are forming a company, our guide to an LLC for a cleaning business covers the steps.
- Count who must be covered. List every employee who enters client properties. Some sureties count owners too: Surety Bonds Direct asks for the number of people covered, owners plus employees.
- Ask about contractors. If you pay any cleaners as 1099 independent contractors, ask the surety in writing whether the bond covers them. A bond written for employees may not.
- Choose the amount. Use the client requirement, or the method in the section above.
- Get two or three quotes. Try an online surety agency, your insurance agent, and an insurance marketplace. Some sellers only sell bonds alongside their own insurance policies, so ask.
- Read the wording before you pay. Look for the conviction clause, who counts as covered, whether owners are covered, exclusions, the term (one or three years) and how cancellation works.
- Screen your team. Since bonds can exclude employees with known prior dishonest acts, run reference checks and, where your state allows, background checks before cleaners work unsupervised.
- Keep the paperwork ready. Save the bond document with the surety’s name and bond number. Send a copy when a client or property manager asks.
- Update and renew. Tell the surety when your headcount moves past the number you bought for, and put the renewal date on your calendar.
Getting bonded fits into the wider setup checklist in our guide on starting a cleaning business.
What does bonded and insured cleaning mean to clients?
To a client, bonded and insured cleaning means two things: insurance pays if your work causes an accident or damage, and a bond pays them back if your employee steals. Our cleaning business insurance guide covers the insurance half and what each policy costs. It is a trust signal, so use it accurately and be ready to prove it.
How to say it honestly
- Only say “bonded” if the bond is active and covers everyone who cleans for you, including you if you clean and the bond covers owners.
- Only say “insured” if you carry at least general liability.
- Put it where clients decide: your website, your quotes, your booking page and your Google Business Profile description.
- Offer proof on request instead of posting policy numbers publicly.
Copy-paste answer when a client asks “Are you bonded?”
“Yes. We carry general liability insurance and a janitorial bond that covers every member of our team who works in your home. I’m happy to email you a copy of the certificate and the bond today. The insurance covers accidents and damage, and the bond covers theft by our employees.”
How a client can check a company is bonded
- Ask for the bond document or certificate, with the surety’s name and the bond number.
- Check that the business name on it matches the company they are hiring.
- Check the dates, and call the surety to confirm the bond is active if the job is high value.
- Ask for a certificate of insurance at the same time, since a bond is not insurance.
Being able to say you are bonded and insured, and prove it in one email, also helps you win cleaning clients who are nervous about handing over a key.
What should you do when a client says something is missing?
Take it seriously, gather facts before blaming anyone, and help the client search, since many missing items turn up. If theft is likely, the client should report it to the police, and you should notify your surety and insurer promptly.
- Listen and write it down. What is missing, where it was kept, when it was last seen, and who else was in the home.
- Check your records. Who cleaned that home, on which dates, and when they arrived and left. Photos from the checklist can show where things were.
- Talk to the cleaner privately. Ask, do not accuse. Items get moved while dusting and put back in the wrong drawer.
- Offer a search. With the client’s permission, check the obvious places together.
- Explain the bond honestly. If your bond has a conviction clause, tell the client a police report is the first step for any claim.
- Notify the surety and your insurer. Follow the notice rules in your bond and policy, and keep copies of everything.
- Decide on staffing. Many owners move the cleaner off that home while the matter is open. Follow your employment rules and avoid treating an accusation as proof.
Habits that prevent claims
- Store keys coded, not labeled with addresses, and remove alarm codes from anything a former employee can see.
- Ask clients to put away cash, jewelry and medicine, and to tell you about any room that is off limits.
- Send two cleaners to new homes for the first few visits when you can.
- Keep clock-in times and photo checklists for every visit, so you can show who was there and what was done.
If you use BroomBook, the crew app records clock-in times and photo checklists for each visit, which gives you that record without extra paperwork.