Covid-19 and Essential Services

COVID 19 – Is your business an “essential service” and, if so, what does that mean for you and your employees.

To help tackle this unprecedented crisis, An Taoiseach has announced further restrictions on the movement of people in Ireland. Everyone must stay at home except for certain limited situations, such as essential food shopping; medical appointments; exercise, or vital family reasons.

Employees can only travel to and from work “where the work is an essential health, social care or other essential service and cannot be done from home”.

What is an Essential Service? 

Employers should refer to the guidance in assessing whether their business is providing an essential service, however, it is not necessary to seek official authorisation.

The list of essential services can be found at:

List of Essential Service Providers Under New Public Health Guidelines

Where a business does fall to be defined as an essential service, it is expected,to “the maximum extent possible”, to carry out its services remotely and employees should only travel to work where there is no other option.

What should employers do? 

Businesses who fall into the category of an essential service should identify those employees who are essential to the provision of that service and notify them. This can be done by category or by individual employee. For some organisations it can include all of their employees and other workers such as subcontractors. If a business is providing an essential service and employees are at work, then latest public health guidance to include social distancing, should be followed at all times.

Where it is a necessity for employees to travel to work employers should advise their employees to carry work identification with them during their commute. Where appropriate, employers should provide employees with a letter confirming that they are an essential employee and giving details of a contact name and phone number of a person within the company who can corroborate this. We would suggest someone in HR as the most appropriate contact person. The guidance states that employees “should at all times bring with them either a work identification or a letter from your employer indicating that you are an essential employee, as well as one other form of identification”.

Employees of businesses who do not fall into the category of an essential service are not currently permitted to travel to and from work until 12 April 2020. There will be a grace period until 6pm on Monday 30 March to allow for an orderly wind down. In exceptional circumstances extra time will be provided. Some companies will also be allowed operate at a reduced level, for example in complex manufacturing processes. 

All employers engaged in essential services should direct their employees, as much as is possible, to work from home. Where such employees cannot work from home public health guidelines should be maintained.

Training Resources

[New] Protecting Data when Home Working in Ireland (limited time offer available)

It is vital that all of your employees – from customer service to marketing and sales, many of which will be home working now - know how to protect your organisation’s confidential data from cyber attacks and fully understand their obligation under data protection legislation to protect the data they handle.

Click here to access a free demo

[Updated] Coronavirus Awareness in the Irish Workplace (Free)

This course will help raise awareness of the coronavirus and provide information for all employees on how to help prevent the spread of COVID-19. This course will also provide you with guidelines on how to protect yourself and your colleagues in the workplace.

Click here to access this course for free