June 8, 2020
Week 13 Retail COVID-19 Updates and Resources
Updated Contact Information: Small Business BC
Small Business BC now has a dedicated COVID-19 resource centre, in partnership with the Government of Canada and the B.C. government.
The BC Business Covid-19 Support Service is a dedicated help service with phone, email and live chat for any businesses to get their COVID-19 questions answered. Additional resources include:
- Small Business Marketplace – a place for small businesses across B.C. to list their businesses and products. Currently we have over 800 businesses listed and are working with partner organizations to promote businesses within the marketplace.
- COVID-19 webinars – with our team of industry experts we have created a series of webinars around dedicated COVID topics such as “Getting Online with Shopify” and “Workplace Health and Safety with WorkSafeBC” – vital skills for businesses planning to stay open and restart their businesses post-Covid.
COVID-19 Drives New and Nimble Strategies
Written by Jacki Hart, April 17, 2020
We have landed in a strange place. A spring where there exists fear, confusion, hesitation, stop-work orders, fines, tension, polarized debates, newly laid off staff, business cash flow that’s on fumes, mixed messages to customers and parents learning to home-school on a moments notice.
The past 6 weeks for me has been filled with dozens of hours every week working with business owners to CTRL>ALT>DEL on ‘the plan that was’ and helping them to pivot to something else, something surreal and completely different. Finding calm and purposeful intention amid chaos and fear is hard work. Way harder than being in the customary slip stream of long spring hours and frenetic days. And being intentional about emerging from the COVID-19 Era able to look back proud of how we handled ourselves, our team our business viability and our brand is the key goal at the moment.
To read the full article, click here.
Can I have more than one worker per crew truck?
Physical distancing of 2m is still the required best practice to reduce the spread of COVID-19. WorkSafe BC has released guidelines for returning to (or continuing) safe operations for businesses. The recommended guidelines for worker transportation from WorkSafe BC are:
- Employers should assess the number of workers being transported at any one given time and employ measures to ensure distance between workers is maintained.
- Whenever possible, workers should travel alone in their vehicles in order to practice physical distancing. If that is the case, employers must implement all the necessary safeguards related to working alone or in isolation, to ensure the safety of these workers.
- Measures that may be taken to ensure appropriate distance include having workers sit one to a seat, with riders staggered to allow maximum distance, adjusting the number of workers taken per trip, and the overall number of trips needed to transport workers to a worksite. It may mean using larger vehicles to ensure maximum spacing, or using multiple vehicles.
- If it is not possible to ensure 2 metres of distance between workers in a vehicle through these measures, the employer must consider other control measures, such as PPE where appropriate.
- Employers should have hand washing facilities or sanitizing stations available to workers as they enter and exit the vehicle.
- Employers must ensure that high contact surfaces within the vehicle are routinely cleaned. These include seat belts, headrests, door handles, steering wheels, and hand holds.
Other tips include reminding staff of your company COVID-19 protocols, notifying clients that your company is still practicing 2m distancing, and posting signage in work trucks and offices/shops about proper hygiene, sanitation and distancing.
Thank you for continuing to keep our industry and the public safe!
