Alicia Dunne, NCC Deputy Director General, reflects on the benefits of meticulous record keeping.
If someone has coronavirus symptoms at work, or becomes unwell in the workplace with coronavirus symptoms, you probably know what to do:
- Tell them to immediately go home and avoid touching anything; use a separate bathroom if possible
- Call 999, if someone is seriously ill – or life is at risk – and it’s best for the unwell person to use their own mobile phone or computer to access these services
- They must then isolate for 7 or 14 days
- You may need to report this under RIDDOR.
So far so good. But what then? There has been a lot of publicity about contact-tracing apps. This is where good record keeping comes in.
- If they were cleaning or servicing appliances on your park, would you know which units the staff member (or contractor) had been inside and when?
- If they were working shifts, would you easily know who their co-workers were? (Some companies are sending whole shifts home for 7 days if one worker reports symptoms.)
- In an office situation, hot desking is temporarily a thing of the past; but if they were working outside, or on a production line, would you know what equipment they have used?
- Do you know who is self-isolating in which unit, and when the period of isolation started and finished?
- Have you a record of who is a key worker, and in which unit they are?
- Most importantly, have you recorded who is on park and unable to go ‘home’ because there is ‘no-where to go home to’ and how many people are in that unit?
If you have this information to hand – whether recorded via technology, spreadsheet or manual record – then the deep cleaning process is much easier.
See also advice from ACAS if someone has symptoms at work.