Cleaning the office coffee machine

An office coffee machine gets cleaned by whoever cannot stand it any longer. That is a bad roster. The drip tray overflows on Monday, the grounds bin jams on Wednesday, and the person who finally deals with it decides the machine is broken.

Most of what keeps a bean-to-cup machine running is small and boring. It wants a name next to it.

What happens every day

Empty the grounds. Empty the drip tray. Check the water, unless the machine is on a plumbed line. Wipe the spout and the bench around it. On a busy site that is twice a day. On a quiet one, once at close.

None of this needs training. It needs someone who knows it is theirs this week.

What happens every so often

Look in the hopper. Beans should move freely, not sit packed down or mixed with the end of an old bag. Finish the open bag before a new one goes in. Storing beans covers the cupboard side: sealed, room temperature, not the fridge.

Wipe the outside. Clear the bench around it. A machine wedged between the kettle and the toaster gets splashed and bumped, and that is how small problems start.

What to leave alone

Do not pull the machine apart. Do not run a descaler someone picked up at the supermarket. Do not tip ground coffee into a hopper built for whole beans. Whole beans versus ground explains why the hopper wants beans.

If the machine shows a fault you do not recognise, stop and ring. A forced fix tends to become a bigger one.

What Arico handles

Servicing and tech support on the Saeco Royal Plus are $0 while you order beans each month. Scale, a blocked spout, and any fault that is not beans or water are ours. Who services the machine covers what that includes. We do not publish a same-day promise on this page.

That is the split. The office does the daily tidy, and we look after the machine. If you are on a hire contract, check whether a scheduled clean is inside the rent or billed on top. Switching suppliers lists the other lines worth reading.

A roster that works

One name a week, on the fridge or in the shared calendar. A spare bag next to the machine, not in a locked cupboard. A cloth that lives beside it and nowhere else.

The person who empties the tray and fills the hopper last thing on Friday is the reason Monday starts with coffee.