Weird smell in hotel elevator after previous cleaner..

[WillS]

We received a call yesterday to clean several elevator banks in a hotel that smelled like throw up. The manager said she had no idea what the smell was from, but they had the carpets in there cleaned 2 days prior by another company. I asked what type of equipment, etc. the company before us used to clean the carpet. She said they came in with a medium sized machine sprayed down the carpet and used a wand to suck up dirt. I'm guessing this was a portable cleaning machine? It smelled bad like mildew. Is this from left over water not being rinsed out of the carpet or maybe types of chemicals they used? We re-cleaned it and sprayed down enzymes, with a deodorizer to rid the smell. I checked with her this evening to see if the smell returned and she said it smells 100% better. (We used a ton of deodorizer, host orange peel extract, and odorzyme). We now scored the whole property hallway and elevator bank cleanings from now on which was pretty cool. So thank god for the hack job before us I guess.

 

[WillS]

Or maybe it could be from several hotel guests having long night bingers and puking in every elevator? The smell reeked the same in each though.

 

[Desk Jockey]

Most likely its a result of inproper drying. Any system that uses moisture (encap,op,hwe) that is not allowed to dry could potentially have an odor issue.

Once those doors close you have no drying taking place. You would need to lock it out to a floor with the doors open.

 

[WillS]

Ahh! I never thought of that. We did ask to lock the elevator to the floor before cleaning and she said we would need to put something to just hold it open. The broom tricked the censor so it wouldn't close, no beeping or anything while it stayed open during the cleaning.

 

[WillS]

Maybe its a good thing it closed after our cleaning to keep the deodorizer in there working. Before we left, I checked the first elevator that was cleaned about an hour before and it was dry and had ridded the smell at that point.

 

[Desk Jockey]

don't be suprised if it still has a faint odor, once the deodorizer evaporates. The same microbial activity that caused the odor to begin with could potentially be an issue until completely dry.

 

[gln]

Possibly not dissolving the detergent I hot water

 

[J Scott W]

The first cleaning could have activated old odor sources (puke, spilled food decaying, etc.) Proper cleaning, drying, deodorizing corrected.

 

[WillS]

Had to go back and repsray another odorzyme down, the smell was still lingering. This time we used something much stronger for dead bodies, mildew, etc. lol I left her a half spray bottle full of it incase the smell came back. Called to check on it today and she said it smells amazing, smell is gone. lol

 

[Lee Stockwell]

Dead body in the bottom of the elevator shaft?

 

[Vivers]

Sounds like a combination of wasn't cleaned thoroughly and did not dry out properly.

This is where some dripods or dry-paths right after you're finished would come in real handy so you could dry them out and elevators could be operational shortly after you do them

 

[WillS]

Lee - it smelt like it. We did see at the bottom of the elevator shaft 2 iphones and 1 Samsung, must been dropped in between the cracks. Should have told them we needed to go down there and inspect.

 

[Jimmy L]

Spray some microban down and it will be done as it is in heaven.