corporate social responsibility

Company Statement

The Statement below summarises our Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). It outlines how Shine Cleaning Solutions will integrate our company's values within its operations and make considered decisions at all times on how our business functions can impact on our stakeholders, who include: our customers; our employees; our suppliers and sub contractors; the local community; and the environment.

Corporate Social Responsibility is fully considered within our company's approach to Health, Safety, Environment, Quality; Equality and Sustainability; and Equality and Diversity. The overall responsibility for developing and integrating this within our company policies, and for reviewing their effectiveness, lies with the Business Director. The Operations Directors then ensure that the core values and behaviours are communicated to all staff through induction, training, and internal communications. The core values and behaviours include:

• behaving with integrity, respect, professionalism and honesty;
• empowering employees to make them aware of their responsibilities and actions;
• a focus on proactive decision making for the benefit of our stakeholders;
• encouraging feedback and review, and looking at new innovative ways in which to improve our approach and our delivery to our stakeholders.

Supporting and Empowering Employees

Our staff are our most important asset. We believe that by investing in our staff by providing fair and competitive rates of pay, rewards and benefits this will pay dividends time and time again.

We are committed to promoting equality of opportunity in all aspects of employment with our company and our Equality and Diversity Policy ensures our staff are aware the benefits of developing and maintaining a diverse workforce where we strive to prevent any form of discrimination. We fully understand our responsibility to look after the welfare of our staff whilst working on our customer sites. We ensure that our staff are well informed through the delivery of clear policies and procedures; and are well- trained and very knowledgeable about the job they are required to do.

We believe in motivating and rewarding our staff with performance based incentives for a job well done. We hope that our staff enjoy their work and become part of the 'wider team' who ensure a safe, healthy working environment on our customer sites.

Caring for the Environment

We recognise that by providing cleaning services to our customers, the nature of how we provide these services may impact detrimentally on the environment. Our Environmental and Sustainability Policy identifies in detail how the company must make balanced decisions to minimise the impact of its operations on the environment. In summary this includes:

• Observing and complying with current and future legislation relating to environmental issues.
• how we will deal fairly and responsibly with suppliers, employees and customers by;
  • Working with suppliers and sub-contractors to promote good environmental practice in the use and disposal of materials used in the company's business.
  • Reduction in carbon emissions through wise use of transportation of equipment and materials.
• how we will create safer and healthier working environments on customer sites by;
  • Promoting and encouraging waste minimisation through 'Reducing, Re-Using and Recycling' methodology and approach; and liaising with customers to assist in the implementation of on-site recycling schemes;
  • Using cleaning systems and products to reduce the need for chemical based products across all customer sites;
  • Minimising the use of energy, water and materials through our cleaning operations where possible.
  • Providing training and information to increase our staff's knowledge and awareness of their environmental responsibilities.
• how we will follow sustainable procurement practices to ensure best value for money
  • responsibly sourcing products and services by taking into account the environmental, social and ethical aspects of the whole product or service life cycle.
  • Specifying the use of environmentally preferable products during our procurement processes; or innovative approaches to reduce environmental impact through use of super concentrated cleaning products, dosing systems, products which reduce packaging etc.
  • Establishing objectives and targets to achieve continual improvement; review, evaluation and auditing of company environmental performance through audit procedures.

Supporting our Local Community

Involvement in the local community is of paramount importance to the company. The company consider itself as part of the local community and is committed to supporting local businesses and local customers where possible. The company will review our support annually to ensure fair representation.

We have provided sponsorship to Craigshill Thistle Junior Football Club in Livingston to help the club to get new uniforms. We have also supported Braid House Day Centre by donating to the centre on several occasions. The centre, who provide day care services to the elderly community within Livingston, receive cleaning services from Shine. It is a pleasure for Shine to be able to provide both a donation towards their Annual Fayre; and also to donate cleaning time to help clean the Centre following the fayre.

The company will also actively support our staff to take part in any charitable or local or national voluntary work.

Customers

The Directors ensure that in all our dealings with customers, or potential customers, we maintain an honest, open and fair approach. We ensure that:

• Our business documentation is clear, informative and honest. We actively request feedback from customers or potential customers. We provide new customers with full contact information for the Directors of the Company and ask that they contact us with any questions, feedback or otherwise to maintain open and positive communication links at all times.
• We are honest and clear about our services and never use cold selling or pressured selling techniques. Our Cleaning Service Level Agreement clearly outlines to customers what services are included, how often, for how much, and includes a very detailed cleaning specification and breakdown of tasks, periodics etc. We always ask customers to consider these and look over the information carefully as they can be amended to suit the customer and their changing needs. If a potential customer is unclear about all the services they may require, we can provide a 'menu' of services which the customer can pick and choose from to ensure they only receive the services they want.
• If something goes wrong, we will investigate, address and action as required. We will maintain communication with the customer to ensure a suitable outcome is achieved for all parties concerned.
• We ask for feedback, good or bad, as this helps to inform how we can achieve greater customer satisfaction and service standards.

Selecting and working with our Suppliers and Sub Contractors

The company develop close professional working relationships with our suppliers and sub contractors. We are not tied to using any one supplier or sub contractor. This ensures that the Company is best placed to have access to any of the market leading brands and quality products within the cleaning industry. This allows the company to select the best product or service for the customer based on their own site requirements.

The company are a 'Pay on Time' supporter and are committed to paying our suppliers and sub contractors on time and making clear our payment terms.