Acquisitions - Additional Information (Detail) (USD $)	3 Months Ended								12 Months Ended															12 Months Ended						12 Months Ended			12 Months Ended
	Oct. 31, 2012	Jul. 31, 2012	Apr. 30, 2012	Jan. 31, 2012	Oct. 31, 2011	Jul. 31, 2011	Apr. 30, 2011	Jan. 31, 2011	Oct. 31, 2012	Oct. 31, 2011	Oct. 31, 2010	Oct. 31, 2012 Janitorial	Oct. 31, 2011 Janitorial	Oct. 31, 2010 Janitorial	Oct. 31, 2012 Security	Oct. 31, 2011 Security	Oct. 31, 2010 Security	Oct. 31, 2012 Customer Contracts	Oct. 31, 2012 Investments in unconsolidated affiliates, net	Oct. 31, 2012 Trademarks	Oct. 31, 2012 Customer contracts and relationships	Oct. 31, 2012 TEGG	May 31, 2012 TEGG	Oct. 31, 2012 TEGG Other Identifiable Intangibles Customer Contracts And Relationships	Oct. 31, 2011 The Linc Group LLC	Dec. 01, 2010 The Linc Group LLC	Jun. 30, 2010 Diversco	Jun. 30, 2010 Diversco Janitorial	Jun. 30, 2010 Diversco Security	Oct. 31, 2012 Diversco Customer contracts and relationships	Oct. 31, 2012 L&R Group	Oct. 01, 2010 L&R Group	Oct. 31, 2012 L&R Group Customer Contracts	Oct. 31, 2012 L&R Group Favorable Leases and Other	Oct. 31, 2012 L&R Group Other Consumer Loans and Leases	Oct. 31, 2012 L&R Group Noncompete Agreements
Business Acquisition [Line Items]
Business acquisition initial aggregate purchase price																							$ 5,500,000				$ 30,600,000
Business acquisition working capital adjustment																						100,000
Business acquisition indemnification hold back amount																						500,000
Direct acquisition cost																						200,000				5,200,000	200,000
Weighted-average amortization period for the acquired intangible assets									10 years 7 months 6 days									14 years	10 years	4 years	10 years 7 months 6 days			14 years						11 years			11 years	4 years	6 years	10 years
Purchase price allocation goodwill																							1,900,000
Revenues from acquired business																						3,900,000
Business acquisition aggregate purchase price																							5,667,000			298,720,000	30,390,000					34,664,000
Revenues	1,090,001,000	1,079,235,000	1,057,244,000	1,073,785,000	1,081,343,000	1,076,247,000	1,060,083,000	1,029,169,000	4,300,265,000	4,246,842,000	3,495,747,000	2,394,344,000	2,380,195,000	2,306,098,000	365,926,000	350,377,000	336,249,000								512,900,000
Operating profit									96,566,000	117,568,000	108,839,000	135,967,000	140,621,000	140,007,000	7,835,000	7,968,000	7,487,000								11,100,000
Goodwill and intangibles assets expected to be amortizable for income tax purposes	131,000,000								131,000,000																		13,100,000				30,200,000
Purchase price allocated to intangible assets																										87,000,000	10,800,000	9,200,000	1,600,000			6,200,000
Purchase price allocated to goodwill																							1,937,000			154,487,000	13,106,000	11,100,000	2,000,000			30,160,000
Assets distributed as consideration																																164,000
Contingent consideration payments related to acquisition	$ 500,000								$ 500,000