Flies are a common pest in Singapore. Houseflies, fruit flies, and the like – all these major kinds of flies seem to be prevalent everywhere in the country, all year round. Due to Singapore’s humid and warm weather, the swarm of flies seems to always be at peak levels. And although you would commonly ignore them in your house, this is usually not the case when these pesky pests roam around your business premises.

As a business owner, it is necessary to make sure that your business establishment is always safe and clean, and this includes diligently preventing a fly infestation by adopting some precautionary measures and hiring reliable pest control services. Otherwise, you would be jeopardising not just the health of your customers but the survival of your business too.

In this article, we discuss how a fly infestation can adversely impact your business in a variety of ways.

Possible contamination

Flies are known to be carriers of more than 200 different pathogens, which can be transmitted to humans in three ways: being swallowed during feeding, through contact with their body parts, and excretion of faeces. These pests lay eggs and feed on decaying materials before landing on surfaces where food is prepared or on the food itself. The anatomy of flies comes with a straw-like tongue that can suck up any bacteria-harbouring matter they consume.

This will not just compromise your business’ food safety standards but will also put your customers and employees at risk. If you own a food-related business, particularly, the presence of flies in and around your food can lead to numerous food-borne illnesses, such as E. coli, typhoid, listeria, and salmonella.

Spread of diseases

Aside from the food-borne illnesses mentioned previously, flies can also transmit respiratory infections like tuberculosis. As such, when your business premises are found to be infested with flies, you may not only find yourself dealing with a troublesome infestation but also with costly compensation claims that result from the medical conditions it has caused.

According to new studies, flies are carriers of more bacteria than health experts once thought. As the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic still loom and dengue outbreaks remain rampant, the last thing you would want as a business owner is to cause another health crisis that is otherwise avoidable with proper sanitation and pest control measures.

Tarnished reputation

The presence of any pest in your establishment can easily damage your business reputation, and compared to other pests, flies tend to be more noticeable and horrifying. Especially with the advent of the internet and social media, publishing negative feedback about your business online has become relatively easy. An encounter with flies while walking around your premises or dining can rapidly become viral.

Apart from making it hard to attract new customers, it may also reduce repeat visits from your once-loyal patrons. Moreover, the confidence and trust of the public towards the safety and credibility of your business could be potentially destroyed too.

Business suspension

When your business premises are infested with flies, the worst thing that could happen is that your business may face regulatory charges, financial penalties, and possible suspension. When that occurs, you may need to undertake additional recovery actions before you can be permitted to resume your business operations.

Some essential recovery actions you may need to take include further site investigation, documentation, audit findings, and process and standard review, among others. To make things more complicated, the price to win back the confidence and trust of your customers can cost a lot more.

Conclusion

The repercussions of a fly infestation at work can be costly in terms of the damage it can cause to your operations, manpower, and reputation. For this reason, it is necessary to prevent a fly infestation from ever occurring on your business premises. The best way to do this is by engaging the services of a professional pest control team that can help you come up with an extensive and effective pest management solution – after all, pest control is important in ensuring workplace safety.

For the most comprehensive and trusted commercial pest control services to help you ensure that no pest will negatively impact your business, PestClinic is the expert you should work with! We provide cost-effective residential, commercial, and industrial pest control services that can powerfully eliminate many types of pests in Singapore, including flies, ants, cockroaches, mosquitoes, rodents, and more. For more information about our services, please feel free to contact us today.