The questions to ask a carpet cleaner before anyone starts

Question 1 — What temperature does the solution reach at the wand?

Heat is one of four variables that govern how soil is released from fiber, alongside chemical action, agitation and time. Lower one and something else has to carry more of the load.

A company should know its own number. Truck-mounted systems commonly run between 200 and 250 degrees Fahrenheit. Spiker runs 230 to 250.

If the answer is vague, that is informative on its own.

Question 2 — Do you neutralise the alkaline cleaner with an acid rinse, and to what pH?

This is the most revealing question on the list.

Alkalinity is what releases oil from carpet fiber — nothing else does that job. But alkaline left in the pile is sticky residue, and sticky residue attracts soil. The acid rinse neutralises it and carries it out during extraction.

It is also the step most often skipped, because it costs time and product and the customer cannot see whether it happened. A carpet that was never rinsed looks identical on the day of service and resoils within weeks.

Two follow-ups depending on the answer. If a company says its solution contains no detergent, ask what is releasing the oil. If a company says its cleaner is alkaline, ask what neutralises it before the carpet dries.

Question 3 — What is your extraction CFM, and is it truck-mounted?

Cleaning and removal are two different jobs. Chemistry and heat suspend the soil; airflow is what physically removes it.

A carpet can be perfectly well suspended and still have most of the soil dry back into the fiber if recovery is weak.

Spiker recovers through a truck-mounted vacuum blower moving 400-plus CFM through a two-inch hose.

Question 4 — When you leave, is the soil out of my house or still in my carpet?

Some methods are designed so that soil is crystallised in place and removed later by the homeowner's vacuum. That is a legitimate design for commercial maintenance and it is not a defect.

But you should know which one you are buying, because the sand in a residential carpet is there precisely because a household vacuum could not remove it.

Question 5 — For urine that has soaked into the pad, how much solution actually reaches the pad?

Urine passes through the carpet face and backing into the padding. Anything applied to the surface is treating a place the material is not.

Methods designed around using a couple of gallons of water for an entire house cannot deliver volume into a pad. That is not a criticism — it is what those methods are for, and it is why their dry times are what they are.

Question 6 — Do you inspect with a blacklight before quoting pet odour work?

Urine residue fluoresces under UV light. The visible surface mark is almost always far smaller than the deposit underneath, and older deposits frequently show nothing at all in daylight.

Quoting urine treatment without locating it first is quoting a guess. It also usually costs the customer more, because the safe guess is to price the whole room.

Question 7 — Are you promising removal, or an attempt?

Anyone guaranteeing complete removal of urine odour without pulling the carpet and replacing the pad is promising something the physical situation does not support.

The honest answer is that a subsurface flood and flush removes as much as can be removed without opening the floor, that it resolves a great many cases, and that until the floor is opened nobody knows how far the deposit travelled.

A company willing to say that is a company telling you the truth about harder things too.

The pricing question that protects you most

Ask for the complete number before anybody starts, in writing, including every add-on for your specific house with your specific pets and your specific room count.

Then ask the definitional questions underneath it:

What counts as a room, in feet? Is a hallway a room? Is a closet a room? Is a staircase a room, and at what price? Is there a minimum service charge? Is pre-vacuuming included or extra? What is the price for pet enzyme, for protector, for urine treatment?

A company that intends to price honestly can answer all of that on the phone in two minutes, because the definitions already exist.

A company that cannot is not being evasive by accident.

What good answers sound like

Specific numbers, given immediately, without needing to check.

Willingness to say what will not come out, before the job rather than after.

A published price list you can read before you dial.

An inspection that happens before equipment comes off the truck, with the complete number given at that point and the statement that it does not change unless you change the job.