Covid-19: Howard Tenens Customer & Supplier Communication

Dear Customer

I hope that this finds you, your family and your colleagues well.

It hasn’t been that long since I last wrote to you, given the PM’s recent announcement placing England into a 4 week lockdown from this Thursday, and the devolved parliaments in other areas of the UK  retaining their own tighter restrictions, I thought you might be interested to see a flavour of our recent colleague communication.

Business Update

We, as Key Workers, have been here before and are ready to carry on with our stringent Covid controls.  Hands – Face – Space will still be the mantra we all follow.  

We will continue to adhere to our Covid rule set and continue to manage the business in line with the following:

• Colleagues, where their roles allow it and at the discretion of the site Divisional Manager, may split working from home and working from site on a rotational basis.
• All meetings, unless business critical, should be held via remote communication tools, such as Microsoft Teams.
• Any meetings held that are business critical must not have more than 6 people in attendance, must be in an appropriately sized room with adequate ventilation ensuring additional controls in risk assessment are instigated in full.
• Any training sessions should be carried out using remote tools.

As we have previously stated, we have already put robust systems in place to ensure your safety and protection at work and we will continue to evolve these where necessary, following Government Guidelines. These systems include, but are not limited to:

• Dedicated COVID-19 Risk Assessments which mitigate risk
• Split shift patterns to minimise numbers of colleagues on site at any one time
• Staggering start, finish and break times
• Increasing break regularity to enable individuals to wash their hands more often
• Working in ‘cohorts’ / fixed teams
• Providing various information during Toolbox Talks
• Additional hand sanitising and cleaning stations
• Signage to act as reminders

Colleague Additional Support

In addition to the above guidelines we have offered all colleagues the opportunity to obtain a flu vaccination that the company will contribute £15 towards covering the cost.

Winter Illness:

As we know, it is the time of year for the common cold to spread amongst us.  It is therefore very important to understand the symptoms or Covid-19 verses a common cold.

We are encouraging colleagues that if they have a temperature, continuous cough or loss/change to smell and taste then please follow the Government guidelines regarding testing and self-isolation.  It is vital that we all adhere to the guidelines and follow them closely so that if anyone experiences symptoms of Covid-19 we do not put our colleagues at risk. 

As the situation evolves, the Howard Tenens Leadership Team continue to monitor the circumstances in readiness to initiate certain actions.  We will continue to communicate with you and provide updates as necessary.

As we enter this second period of lockdown it is likely that people may feel heightened anxiety, we have and continue to offer various routes for colleagues to seek support.  We have also recently enhanced our Employee Assistance Programme to make it even easier for colleagues to find confidential support. This alongside our growing number of site based Mental Health First Aiders all help to ensure we avoid colleagues feeling unnecessarily anxious.

Howard Tenens is well placed to navigate this challenging time. We have robust policies, procedures and support in place that are regularly monitored to ensure we continue to provide great service as we work towards and through the Christmas peak period.  If you have any questions or concerns please do not hesitate to contact your local site representative.