Your client wants proof the bed bugs are gone
By Skatek · · 4 min read
You show a client that a bed bug treatment worked by measuring the same way before and after it: the same monitors in the same places, checked on a schedule, with a written note after every visit. One quiet visit is not proof. Clear means weeks of checks with nothing found.
Why isn't a visual check enough?
Because low numbers are easy to miss. In treated apartments, interceptors left under beds and sofas caught nearly six times as many bed bugs over ten weeks as visual inspections of the same rooms (Wang, Gibb and Bennett 2009). In a programme covering more than 500 UK hotels, 9.5% of rooms with a negative report were confirmed infested within six months, usually two to four months after treatment (Boase 2022).
Many companies don't check at all. In a survey of French pest control companies, 63% waited for the client to call after treatment rather than going back to look (Jourdain et al. 2016). That leaves the client to find out for you.
When should you check after treatment?
University of Arkansas extension advice is to evaluate each treatment within two weeks, and to treat no activity for 60 days, with proper monitoring and inspection, as the accepted sign that bed bugs are gone (Hopkins 2014). In a Rutgers field study, researchers checked traps every two weeks and only called an apartment clear after eight weeks in a row with zero trap catch and nothing seen on inspection (Cooper, Wang and Singh 2015).
A plan your client can follow:
| Visit | When | What you do |
|---|---|---|
| Survey | Before treatment | Inspect, place monitors, note where activity is |
| First check | Within two weeks of treatment | Inspect, read monitors, treat again if needed |
| Follow-up checks | Every two weeks | Same monitors, same places, same notes |
| Sign-off | After about eight weeks with nothing found | Final report to the client |
How do you make before and after comparable?
- Mark on a floor plan where each monitor goes, and use the same spots every visit.
- Leave monitors for the same length of time before each reading.
- Photograph the bed, seams and monitors each time, from the same angles.
- Note the room temperature and whether anyone slept there.
The last point matters most in hotels and empty flats. With no one in the room there are no host cues, and the Bed Bug Foundation warns that monitoring can then give false negatives (PPC Online). Below about 13°C bed bugs become inactive (PPC 115), so a clear reading from a cold, empty room tells you little.
We built ExHale for rooms like these. Its programmable dispenser releases an aerosol that imitates a breathing person through CO₂ and kairomones on the nights you choose, so an empty room reads as occupied. Run it in the same place during the survey and at each check, and your before and after readings come from the same conditions. It contains no pesticides and is a monitoring tool, not the treatment. We covered the empty room problem in more detail in our post on human bait.
What should the report show?
- Date, rooms checked, and who did the visit.
- What you placed, where, and for how long.
- What you found. Zero is a result, so write it down.
- Photos from the same angles as last time.
- The next visit date, and what happens if activity turns up.
The BPCA Code of Best Practice asks for at least two visits, a report after every visit, and a quote that says what happens if control is not achieved after the last one (BPCA). Four reports with the same rooms, the same monitors and nothing found give the client something concrete to rely on when the next guest or tenant moves in.
FAQ
Does one clear follow-up mean the bed bugs are gone?
No. Survivors and eggs can show up weeks later. Keep checking until you have about eight weeks with nothing found.
What if the room is empty between guests or tenants?
Use an active monitor that gives off host cues, and check the temperature. Passive monitors in a cold, empty room can stay empty even when bed bugs are there.
Skatek Hub keeps notes, photos and follow-up visits for each job and turns them into a PDF report for the client, with or without ExHale. To see how ExHale fits your after-control, read about how it works.