Steamatic can help with damaged property, but pets depend on you.
Damaged property can be restored, though. Our fire restoration process has been refined over our four decades in service, and our simple 3-step response can get you and your family back on your feet in no time. Once the fire has been put out and you have gotten to a safe area, the first thing you should do is call your insurance company. Once your insurer has completed an inspection of the damages and sorted out all coverage policy issues, the Steamatic team will arrive on scene to evaluate the area. We forward all relevant findings to your insurer, then dive into our cleaning, repairing, and rebuilding process to rid your home or business of any toxic chemicals and foul odours.
Unfortunately, the safety of your pets cannot be so easily restored. The onus to protect them through preventative measures and proper fire response is on you in that moment. The Steamatic team can help you when it comes to designing a prevention and response plan, though. Read on to learn 6 fire safety tips to help protect your pets!
Eliminate problematic play areas for your pets.
Pets are natural explorers who can get into all kinds of trouble if left to chase down every curiosity that pops into their brains. Thoroughly inspect your house for any areas that your animal explorers may get themselves into trouble, keeping a careful eye out for fire hazards. Some of the more common causes for house fires are loose wires, stove knobs, plant lights, and candles that have been turned on, agitated, or toppled over by pets. Identify and address as many of these issues as possible.
Extinguish all open flames before leaving the room.
Dancing flames can be irresistible to curious pets. Light’s hypnotic effect on animals is the reason that deer will be drawn to headlights. It isn’t hard to imagine the kind of trouble your pets can cause if they are left unsupervised near candles, fireplaces, and cooking appliances. Don’t give them the chance to cause an accident. Extinguish all open flames and heating appliances before leaving the room.
Lock puppies and kittens in safe spots when you’re away.
If you think your full-grown cat or dog is curious, then you should have seen them as youngsters! Puppies and kittens are not only more curious as they first explore and experience the world, but their cute little bodies can squeeze into dangerous places more easily. Furthermore, their risk-aversion skills are not as refined as your more experienced pets, so they will need some extra attention to keep safe. When you are leaving your home, it is best to confine these cute little critters to safe spots where they will be sure to avoid any potential hazards.
Train your pets according to your fire response plan.
Every home needs a fire response plan in place. Everyone needs to know the best escape routes, an agreed-upon meeting place, and where the fire extinguishers are. Part of this fire response plan should include keeping leashes and collars with updated I.D. tags so that you can quickly get your pets out of the home. You should also make an effort to train your pets to exit using your escape routes by having the family assemble and hurry out of the house along these paths.
Use pet safety stickers on your window.
These stickers indicate to firefighter responders how many pets are in your home. This gives them the ability to do a quick head count to know if additional rescue efforts are needed.
By following these 5 safety tips, you should be able to prevent any harm from coming to your pets. Once you and your pets have gotten to a safe area, you will need to start thinking about where you will all stay. When it is time to start restoration work, remember to call Steamatic at 1-888-767-7616. We are available all day, every day, and are standing by to help get you and your pets back into your home.
Let There Be Light: Light and Diffuser Cleaning Perks and Tips
The lighting industry has recognized this consumer neglect and tried to adapt to it. Traditionally this has meant that lighting manufacturers will overdesign their lighting equipment to endure built up dust, grime, and other contaminants. Though this has helped home and business owners keep the lights on despite their lack of cleaning maintenance, it ultimately costs them more money. Running bigger, overdesigned lights requires more energy, but downsizing is not an option if proper cleaning habits are not maintained.
Cleaning lighting and diffusers saves big money.
A Penn State University study of New York businesses’ energy usage concluded that the unnecessary energy expenditure of poorly maintained lights was incredibly high. This study estimated that clean and well-maintained lighting would save these companies more money each year than they spent on maintenance costs. In other words, investing in a Steamatic light and diffuser cleaning puts money in your pocket.
Another way that you will end up saving money is by reducing the amount you spend each year on replacement lighting. Dirt and dust accumulating around wires and other components are some of the more common causes of faulty lighting, and Steamatic stops these contaminants dead in their tracks. Keep your lights running better and longer for less!
Cleaning lighting and diffusers boosts workplace productivity.
Poorly-lit businesses, home offices, and kitchens all suffer from sluggish productivity levels that could all be boosted with a small investment in Steamatic’s professional cleaning service. Many people respond best to a clean, brightly-lit workspace, and if you are working in a kitchen, workshop, or other manual labour setting, you will need to maximize visibility to protect your workers. Shadows, glare, and uneven lighting forces your workers to slow down in these environments to avoid cuts, slips, and other mistakes. This means that not only will a professional Steamatic light and diffuser cleaning put money in your pocket with concrete energy savings, but it lets you make the most of your time, allowing you to make more sales, get more done, and spend less time fixing mistakes.
Easy cleaning tips to enhance your maintenance routine.
If you think the financial, safety, and productivity perks of cleaning lights and diffusers are worth it, then you are probably looking for some simple maintenance strategies. When you first decide to tackle your dirty lighting after a long period of neglect, the best advice that you will hear is to contact Steamatic light and diffuser cleaning experts. While we will be sharing some easy maintenance tips to add to your routine below, these will likely be insufficient for the first big clean. Years of dust and grime take some serious effort to clean, and these jobs are best left to the professionals. Once the first big clean is out of the way, you can follow these simple maintenance tips yourself:
Cleaning and maintaining your lighting and diffusers is important whether you are at home or at work. Business owners should seriously consider outsourcing their light and diffuser cleaning duties to Steamatic; we are an affordable, experienced, and industry-leading company that can free up your maintenance staff for other important duties, and have your lights working again like new!
Know Thy Enemy: 3 Multifarious Molds to Watch Out For
Fungi grow by releasing spores into the air. These reproductive cells are not visible to the naked eye, and when you consider that there can be thousands of mold spores in any given cubic foot of indoor air, it is not hard to see why mold growth prevention can be tricky. Even if growth conditions are not ideal, many spores can lie dormant for years until the environment becomes more suitable. The most common places that you will spot mold growth include the spaces beneath bathroom and kitchen sinks, the gap behind appliances where slow plumbing leaks are common, around the edges of windows, and any other humid part of the home. If you are going to stand up to stubborn mold growth, then you should know that there are three main types of fungus to watch out for:
Understanding the Threat of Water Damage in the Home
Water – a common catastrophe
In Canada and elsewhere in the world, water damage is one of the most common and problematic forms of disaster damage that is experienced by home and business owners. Water damage is caused by all sorts of conditions, from hostile weather and natural flooding to man-made issues like leaky pipes and firefighting collateral.
Water damage is as destructive as it is common. Unwelcome water in your home or business can affect almost every part of your property. Water can rot wooden floors, furniture, siding, and landscaping ties. It will rust any steel and metal surfaces, de-laminate your plywood, and eat away at your concrete foundation. Drywall weakens on contact and eventually crumbles into a useless damp mess. Worst of all, water destroys electronics. In this increasingly digital age, damaged electronics have far-reaching implications. You could lose your livelihood if your laptop and other equipment is damaged, while precious memories can be washed away if USB sticks and digital camera are submerged. The same holds true if photo albums, business documents, or antique books get wet. Losing your furniture or appliances is an expensive inconvenience, but losing these kinds of priceless items is a tragedy.
Understanding water damage classifications
They say an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and this is certainly true of water damage. Steamatic’s water damage restoration services have proven themselves capable of helping even the most water-logged of homes recover. Steamatic’s mold remediation, water clean-up, and restoration services have been calibrated over 40 years of service to give you the best results, but nothing beats prevention. Prevention is only possible if you know your enemy, however.
The first classification of water damage is Clean Water. As the name would have you believe, clean water damage does not pose a significant health risk to humans initially. When a sink or tub overflow and spill out onto the floor, you are dealing with clean water damage. Though not initially harmful to people, clean water spillage can still contribute to the growth of harmful mold and bacteria, cause certain materials to degrade, and poses an electrical shock hazard in certain areas of the home.
Grey water is the second tier in the water damage classification system. Grey water is significantly more dangerous than clean water, as it contains traceable amounts of chemical, biological, and physical pollutants. If people are exposed to this kind of water, or accidentally ingest it, they are at risk of serious illness. Washing machines, toilets, and dishwashers all produce grey water. Grey water is also much more likely to house the bacterial cultures needed for dangerous mold growth.
The final classification for water damage is Black Water. Black water is highly unsanitary. Brimming with bacteria, fungi, and other pollutants, exposure to black water is severely toxic. Sewage leaks, seawater, and contaminated river water are all typical sources of black water damage.
Water damage restoration options
All classifications of water can wreak havoc on your home, business, documents, and electronic devices. Each of these scenarios requires its own unique forms of treatment, but generally speaking, the most important piece of advice you will hear is that you need to act fast. Time is not on your side during watery disasters. You will incur much more serious damages if you hesitate to seek help, as each passing minute moves you further away from the chance of a full recovery. Any delay will put you at greater risk of mold damage, and any documents exposed to water will become much more likely to perish.
Steamatic makes their emergency response team available 24/7, so that you can treat any water damages fast, and put yourself in the best possible position for a full recovery. Call 1-888-767-7616 at any time for immediate restoration service. Steamatic offers solutions for every kind of water damage problem. Freeze-dry and restore your documents; clean, dry, and restore your property; rid your home or business of mold in a safe and environmentally-friendly fashion – it is all possible with the Steamatic team on your side. Be sure to call within 24 hours to avoid the onset of secondary problems like mold and material erosion.
Air Duct Cleaning FAQ: 3 Common Questions Answered
This service is especially useful after home construction of any scale, thorough cleanings, and move-ins. During these times, airborne allergens are created, and existing dusts and pollutants are agitating. As a result, your family or business may be housed in a property that is recirculating polluted air. Many serious health repercussions have been linked to poor indoor air quality, but calling 1-888-767-7616 can put you at ease.
If you are interested in air duct cleaning, but want to learn more before giving us a call, then read on for all you need to know!
When is duct cleaning appropriate?
As mentioned earlier, air duct cleaning is best following any activity that is agitating or create airborne allergens. Air duct cleaning should be an important part of your general home maintenance routine, occurring once every 1-2 years at minimum. Furthermore, indoor air specialists agree that duct cleaning is needed in the following conditions:
How are the ducts cleaned?
Each air duct cleaning job calls for something different, as both the layout of the ducts and their problems are unique from home to home. The Steamatic team tailors custom cleaning solutions to your home’s specific needs, but some general principles do apply. In every cleaning scenario, Steamatic uses patented air duct and vent cleaning equipment that has evolved and refined through 40 years on the job. Aside from cleaning your vent covers and ducts with scrubbing and high-suction vacuuming equipment, we make sure to clean your HVAC coils and treat any water or mold damage that we come across during our thorough inspection. To learn more, visit our air duct cleaning page, or call us 1-888-767-7616.
What are some maintenance tips I can use to prevent any problems?
You can take some steps to prevent duct contamination in the home and workplace. The most important thing you can do is to schedule a routine inspection with Steamatic professionals. This recruits a set of highly-trained and experienced eyes to detect any imperfections before they become problems.
The next thing you can do is to perform routine preventive maintenance on your HVAC system. You should comply with the maintenance schedule recommended by your manufacturer. We also offer an HVAC cleaning service if you are unsure how to properly locate and clean your coils and components.
As a general rule, you should always try to seal off any ductwork when you are doing anything that could agitate airborne allergens. Take the time to create a seal before any serious construction, cleaning, or moving takes place. Good housekeeping is vital for air duct problem prevention, but without a proper seal, it can cause more harm than good.
The final step you can take to prevent air duct pollution problems is to try to keep contaminant sources away from your air intakes. This can include dusty old furniture, musty storage boxes, damp mop buckets, or anything that ends up cluttering up basements across Canada.
How do I avoid scams?
The proliferation of fly-by-night air duct scammers and door-to-door salesmen has scared many people away from this service. Don’t let scammers discourage you – they are robbing you of the money-saving, healthy-breathing, easy-heating benefits of air duct cleaning. All you need to do is chose a company you can trust. Our Steamatic team has a stunning customer service history, with success that can be measured in the miles of clean ducts we have left in our wake. Don’t take a gamble on an unproven company – choose Steamatic for an affordable clean that you can book 24/7.
4 Benefits of Steamatic Carpet and Upholstery Cleaning Services
Many homeowners across Canada are guilty of letting dirt, stains, and pet dander accumulate on their carpet and upholstery. Young, dynamic couples will often move into a new property with big plans for the future, letting their decorative ambitions chase down any fancy. Before long, this young couple will have an interior decor with the kind of contemporary style that rivals the tastes of even the most seasoned of home staging staff. White furniture, richly coloured drapes, and immaculate carpet all combine to create the perfect sanctuary for these happy young homeowners. But over time, things change; work picks up, kids pop into the annual Christmas card picture, and you find yourself with less time for cleaning and maintenance.
Finding time to clean these things in your home is easier said than done. The main problem is that cleaning your carpet and upholstery is a job that never truly ends. Carpet and upholstery has the kind of fibrous, absorbent texture that clings to dirt and drinks up any spill. Before long, everyday use can blemish your white furniture and leave your carpets with more food particles than the kitchen pantry.
Regular cleaning simply won’t suffice. Read on to learn 4 benefits of Steamatic’ professional furniture, carpet, and upholstery cleaning system.
Avoid any collateral damage from amateur cleaning efforts.
Amateur cleaning efforts are usually more than enough to take care of the various chores around the house, but when it comes to your expensive carpeting and upholstery, a professional touch is recommended. Amateur cleaning efforts are usually motivated by some questionably-sourced online DIY tips, and undertaken with less-than-perfect cleaning tools. Attacking your chic couch or your lush carpet with an old cloth coated in vinegar is as bad an idea as it sounds. Doing so risks fading colours, grinding stains further into the fabric you are trying to clean, and fraying threading away with too much elbow grease.
The results of most attempts to rent industrial cleaning equipment are underwhelming. These steam cleaners demand a certain level of experience and skill that amateurs cleaners simply don’t have. Renting one will cost you money, force you into a lot of heavy lifting, and ultimately waste a day for a sub par cleaning.
Why even bother when Steamatic offers a timely, affordable, and pristine clean in a single day? The equality of our carpet and upholstery cleaning services are supported by over 40 years of success in the industry.
Protect your family from harmful airborne particles.
Steamatic uses special industrial-strength Lambrite cleaners, emulsifying agents, and more to remove all dirt, dust, and dry contaminants from your carpet and upholstery. This cuts down the volume of allergens in your home considerably. Every time you slump down on the couch after a long day, dormant allergens are kicked into the air around you. Steamatic minimizes this, while also ridding these furnishings of any mold spores that could affect respiratory health.
Liven up the look of your home.
The most obvious and important reason that homeowners seek out our Steamatic cleaning services is to give their furnishings new life. Colours will shine brightly again, and stains will be a distant memory once our cleaning process is complete. As part of the full sensory experience, your furnishings will also smell great. We force a powerful and patented emulsifying agent deep into the fibers of your carpet; this solution breaks down any contaminants, which are then sucked up by industrial-strength vacuuming equipment. Your carpet is left with a factory-fresh clean, and nearly dried so that musty smells cannot be created.
Increase the lifespan of your furnishings.
Though often overlooked, the longevity benefits of our cleaning process are quite impressive. Factory-fresh carpeting has each fiber protected by a stain, soil, and oil-resistant coating, but this wears away over time. Once this coating is gone, your carpet will degrade at a much faster rate, making deep-cleaning efforts that much more important.
The Steamatic clean adds years to the life of your expensive carpet and upholstery, essentially putting money back into your pocket that would be spent otherwise on replacement furnishings.
Enlist Steamatic Specialists in Your Fight Against Graffiti
How can I prevent graffiti on my property?
To understand the limitations of graffiti prevention efforts, it is important to understand who is typically responsible for this form of vandalism. Graffiti is most often created by bored youth or active gang members. Both of these demographics are mostly unconcerned with municipal laws and community efforts; indeed, their vandalism is typically their attempts to lash out against these very institutions. For this reason, anti-graffiti policy often has very limited success. Some active interventions that you can take against the spread of graffiti include:
How can I remove graffiti from my property?
Steamatic cleaners have been handling this kind of issue on a variety of residential and business surfaces for over 40 years. We are available 24/7 for emergency clean-ups, and can be your greatest ally in your community’s fight against graffiti with our fast response and stunning results. We can remove your graffiti and also erect deterrents, as we have in the past by boarding up abandoned properties that were routinely vandalized.
When you contact us, you need to identify what kind of surface has been marked. Brick, concrete, aluminum siding, utility boxes and poles, pavement, wood, and glass are all commonly victimized by vandals. These surfaces have very different characteristics, and their varying textures call for different cleaning solutions.
Call 1-888-767-7616 for your free quote and consultation. We are available any time, and are standing by to help in your fight against graffiti!
Shrink Your Eco Footprint With Steamatic Cleaning Services
Many people are looking for ways to have to their cake and eat it too; that is, to pay-it-forward for the environment without having to give up some of the modern amenities and health necessities which we have grown accustomed to.
One area that should not be neglected is your home’s cleanliness and maintenance. To do so under the pretense that it will help the environment is completely flawed. Though it is certainly useful to ban all toxic chemical cleaners and aerosol sprays from your home, cutting out your cleaning efforts entirely can actually do more harm than good for our global energy and environmental crisis.
How does cleaning and maintaining my home help the environment?
Steamatic is a proud Canadian company that internalizes this country’s environmentally-conscious values. We offer a number of restoration and maintenance services that can help you clean up your home while you clean up the environment. Don’t settle for cheap, stinky, and caustic chemical cleaners that will put your family, pets, and possessions at risk
Moisture Control Tips for Mold Prevention
Sure, mold can be good, but it can also be very, very bad. Steamatic mold and mildew remediation services deal with the bad mold, and have helped keep Canadian homeowners safe from allergenic, pathogenic, and toxic molds for over 40 years. Though mold remediation with Steamatic is highly effective, prevention is always the best practice. Read on for some moisture control tips to help prevent dangerous mold growth in your home!
Stop Mold with Steamatic: Six Signs of Mold Exposure
Unfortunately, it is nearly impossible to mold-proof your home. Mold grows easily, and feeds on fundamental elements, so it is hard to eliminate entirely, unless you want to ban water from your home.
Though you cannot mold-proof your home, you can certainly increase its mold-resistance. Steamatic recommends checking all plumbing fixtures and window sills, as well as the areas around heating, kitchen, and bathroom appliances. Furthermore, a thorough inspection of the basement, drywall, and ceilings should be done, looking for any damp spots. If you suspect that you have mold in your home, contact Steamatic’s mold and mildew remediation department today. Don’t wait until it is too late; if you or your loved ones display any of the following signs, you could be experiencing early symptoms of toxic mold exposure:
