Squeegee

Cambridge Dictionary defines the word as “a tool with a rubber blade and a short handle that is used for removing water from a surface such as a window or mirror after it has been washed.” The blade, the handle and the example surfaces are the dictionary's description of the object, not words from a glass cleaning standard.

Two parts of that definition matter on glass. The tool is used on a surface that has already been washed, so it follows the washing rather than doing it, and its job is removing water. Both line up with where NGA puts the tool in its method.

NGA's published routine method places the tool at one point: “Immediately following the application of the cleaning solution, a window cleaning squeegee should be used to remove all of the cleaning solution from the glass surface.” Among NGA's own DO NOT items is allowing water or cleaning residue to remain on the glass or adjacent materials.

Grit trapped between a cleaning tool and the glass is the scratch risk NGA's paper warns about in routine cleaning, taken up at whether window cleaning can scratch the glass. Not every published method ends with this step: in the pure water technique NGA records, the rinse is generally allowed to evaporate instead. What comes before the squeegee in the routine method, the fabric applicator that carries the solution, is defined at scrubber sleeve; whether a squeegee beats a cloth is taken up at is a squeegee better than a cloth on windows; and the full routine order is laid out in the window cleaning method section.