Washing at 60 for holiday lets

[peter_964rs]

This may or may not be the wrong forum for this question but....

 

1. I have been told by someone I know that runs a pub with letting rooms that she must wash all bedlinen for her rooms on a 60 degree cycle. I don't know if this is by law, or because her pub chain demands it, and can't ask her unfortunately. I can't find any HSE guidance on the matter and wondered if anyone here knew? I can only assume this is for control of bacteria.

2. I run a holiday let business and we're expanding with three new shepherd's huts this year. We have decided to do our own laundry as we can't find a reliable, quality linen service locally, which means investing in several washing machines and tumble dryers. If I need to wash at 60 degrees, the cycle time will be a long one and I'd prefer to get the cleaners to come, strip the beds of duvet covers, sheets & pillow cases, gather towels and tea towels and towelling robes, and stick them in the wash so that by the time they've cleaned each hut, re-dressed it with fresh linen from store and so on, they can take the now-clean wash out and stick it in a dryer and leave it for us to retrieve later and send off for ironing (we won't do the ironing as we do have someone reliable for that). Hence:

   a) Any recommendations for what drum size I should go for? Perhaps two machines with a 10kg drum, or three with a 6kg drum, or some other setup?

   b) Any recommendations for what machine to buy, so that I can get a fast (but effective) wash at 60 degrees? The bigger machines all seem to take hours.

   c) I read the article on hot fill versus cold fill. I assume that, if I could find a hot fill machine, I could save significant time by providing water that is already at the correct temperature?

 

Thanks for your help in advance!

[Whitegoodshelp (Andy)]

Hello Peter. Washing at 60° is supposed to kill bacteria and bedbugs. I always used to recommend everybody washed bedlinen and towels at 60°. However, I have recently realised that a lot of sheets and other laundry items have wash labels that state they should be washed at 40°. So the main thing I would do is check all wash labels on everything. If they say they can be washed at 60° then I would definitely do so. Washing at 60° would actually benefit your washing machine in that it will help to keep it free from bacteria and free from grease and grime that can quite quickly destroy any washing machine that is only ever used on low wash cycles.

If you're washing laundry in any semi-commercial capacity you need a real high quality washing machine or you will be constantly replacing them. All washing machines take hours by the way. It's the new method. Caused by machines trying to use as little water as possible whilst trying to achieve good wash label status.