Bedbug Control Sutton Town Centre

Tell Them Straight Away

However far away they are, your housemate needs to hear about it from you, and soon. It is their room, their bed and their belongings, and they may be the one who can tell you where the bugs came from. A short, calm message does the job: what you found, which room, a photo if you have one, and that you are arranging a look before anyone spends money.

Ask them three things. Can their room be opened and treated while they are away? Is there anything in it they would not want touched, moved or heated? And when exactly are they due back? The answers decide almost everything else.

Their Room Is Part of the Job

It is tempting to treat only the room where you saw them and leave the empty one shut. Bedbugs do not respect a closed door, though. An unoccupied room goes quiet because nobody is sleeping there, not because it is clear, and a room that looks clean can still hold bugs that will wake up hungry when its owner comes home.

So when we come to the house we want to see every bedroom and the shared sofa. If the empty room shows signs, it is treated along with yours. If it shows none, we will say what we did and did not find, and you can decide together. An inspection starts from £120 and answers that question properly.

Leave Their Things Where They Are

Do not start bagging up your housemate’s wardrobe or carrying their mattress out to the bins. Moving someone else’s belongings round the house spreads bugs, and throwing out a bed before treatment is rarely needed. If they want their bedding and clothes washed, a hot wash and a hot tumble-dry, bagged straight from the dryer, is the most useful thing a friend can do.

Timing Treatment Around Their Return

Heat treatment usually takes one visit and most of a day, so it can be finished well before a flight lands. It costs more than chemical. Chemical treatment usually needs two, sometimes three visits about 10 to 14 days apart, so if they are due back midway, they come home to a course still running and need to know what not to do in their room.

Either way, their suitcase matters. Travellers sometimes bring bedbugs home, so ask them to unpack in a hard-floored room, put clothes straight in the wash and keep the case off the bed. If the bugs arrived with them, not with you, that is useful to know rather than something to argue about.

If the house is rented, report it to the landlord or agent in writing. Who arranges and pays depends on the tenancy and the cause; we are pest controllers, not legal advisers. The Sutton borough page covers the first fortnight in a family house, much of which applies to a share too.

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