Polish Cleaning Association – history

Polskie Stowarzyszenie Czysto?ci (Polish Cleaning Association) was founded in 2000 in Bydgoszcz. Embracing producers, suppliers as well as cleaning constructors.
In 2002 PSC signed a co-operation agreement with the biggest organization in our trade ISSA (International Sanitary Supply Association).
The year 2003 abounded with many important events. PSC together with ISSA and RAI Amsterdam organized the Trade Show ISSA/Interclean Central & Eastern Europe, which took place in Pozna? in May of 2003.
In January 2003 the Association organised the first Og?lnopolskie Dni Czysto?ci (All-Poland Days of Cleanliness) hosted in Bydgoszcz, which instantly became a celebration for cleaning businesses in our country. There were a lot of suppliers and services company that had a chance to participate in interesting lectures, meet their business partners, take part in thrilling competitions and games only to call it a day by a mug of beer being entertained by stage professionals.
After a meeting with the President of Public Procurement Department Tomasz Czajkowski, Polish Cleaning Association was included in the batch of organizations consulting the new Public Procurement Bill.
In August 2003 parallel to the existing section of cleaning businesses, there emerged two more which have very precise goals to pursue. The first one is to develop cleaning procedures and standards for healthcare facilities, while the other one is to prepare certification criteria for service businesses.
For PSC’s members a legal advice post was created at the Board Administration Office whose aim is to inform the association members about amendments in laws pertaining to our business and if necessary voicing objections at improperly run tenders. The advice is free.
In November the Programme Board took a decision about carrying on developing a cleaning business glossary/lexicon.
In December the President of the Board met ISSA Europe director Mark Armitage and its President Richard Schilling in Germany, where a decision was taken about wider participation of PSC in Trade Show ISSA/Interclean Central & Eastern Europe. Declarations on continuing co-operation between the organisations on the exclusiveness principle were maintained.
In April of 2004 there were 2nd All-Poland Cleanliness Days in Bydgoszcz. The patronage of the event was kindly accepted by the Environment Minister and the President of Bydgoszcz.
In 2004 an agreement with T?V Rheinland Polska was signed aimed at carrying out a programme “Cleanliness and Hygiene Certificate” - the first trade quality mark in Poland. Its goal is to upgrade the quality of the services offered by cleaning constructors.
The 2005 was - the first of all - the year of the second edition of ISSA/Interlean Central & Eastern Europe. The show exceeded all expectations and the organizers (Amsterdam RAI, International Sanitary Supply Association and the Polish Cleaning Association) were very pleased with the results. We can say all market leaders in the industry were present, more than 130 exhibitors participated in the show, and a total of 2,304 visitors attended the trade fair. The conference programme was also very well received. The conference, organised by ISSA and the PSC, hosted over 100 visitors per day.
In 2005 Polish Cleaning Association become a part of European Federation of Cleaning Industries (EFCI) which was founded in 1988, and represents and promotes the interests of cleaning contractors vis-?-vis the European Institutions.
In 2006 PSC in co-operation with T?V Academy Poland Ltd created training programme for cleaning workers, supervisors, traders and managers. PSC togather with T?V obtained resources from European Social Fund for realisation this training project - we trained 1000 people from cleaning sector. Apart from mentioned programme PSC developed three-stage training system. Training companies that realize this programme are accreditated by PSC. In this three-stage system we trained about 2000 of workers.
The new PSC’s educational project is addressed to facility managers. The Association realizes trainings for this group of people in co-operation with Forum Publisher.
In 2007 the most important event for cleaning brach was ISSA/Interclean Central & Eastern Europe Trade Show that took part in Warsaw. Trade accumulated 200 exhibitors and almost 3000 of visitors. As always there were organized some accompanying events like conferences, friendly football match betwieen the representatives of distributors and Gala Dinner during wich there were awarded “Golden Brooms” in following categories: the best technology, the best product and the most interesting stand.
PSC established co-operation with one of the biggest polish newspaper “Rzeczpospolita”. We campaigned for maiking society aware how importatnt is mainatining cleanliness in public places for human health. How important it is for awoiding infections and how big difference there is between domestic cleaning and profesional cleaning.
Apart form co-operation with many newspapers and magazines PSC created first branch magazine “Forum Czysto?ci”.
In 2007 Cleanliness and Hygiene Certificate became international. We signed co-operation agreement with Ukraine, Russia and Hungary. It was recognized as the first step to creating one european quality standard.
When the Polish Cleaning Association was established its founders decided that association will functioning until it will be possible to create Chamber of Commerce. In 2007 all registration documents were sent to court.
16th of October 2008 we registered Polish Cleaning Chamber of Commerce. All members of association are members of chamber, so probably in 2009 The Chamber will replace Polish Cleaning Association.
The 2008 is a next challenge for Polish Cleaning Association. We decided to replace All-Poland Cleanliness Days by conferences that are devoted to maintain cleanliness in hospitals. In relation to this subject PSC togather with Polish Association of Epidemiological Nurses and Polish Society for Hospital Higiene published “Standards of maintain cleanliness in hospitals”. This is the first that kind of publication in Poland.
Polish Cleaning Association has 100 members and it’s still grownig. Within a few years became one of the biggest and strongest national cleaning association in Europe.