A guide to working safely during COVID-19

As always, but now more than ever, your safety is of key importance to us here at Vivastreet. 

We continue to advise users to work remotely during the pandemic whenever possible, via our phone and camming services. However, if this isn’t possible, you should protect yourself and others by working safely.

• General Safety Guidance
• Take Hygiene Precautions
• Use Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
• Support Test and Trace

The Government has issued advice for people working in close contact with others at the present time, setting out the safety measures they should follow to stop the spread of coronavirus. The full guidance can be found here. 

To make things a little easier for you, below we’ve highlighted some of the key measures contained within the guidance.

General safety guidance

• Check with clients when booking an appointment that they – or those they have been in contact with recently – do not have symptoms of coronavirus
• Do not see any client that is displaying symptoms of coronavirus, such as a continuous cough or high temperature
• Do not offer services that involve the highest risk of droplet transmission from the nose and mouth, for example through kissing or oral sex without protection. This means avoiding services and positions that involve prolonged face-to-face contact with a client
• If you or any of your household develop symptoms, please follow the Government guidance on self-isolating and applying for a test

Take hygiene precautions

• Sanitise your hands before and after every meeting
• Ask your client to sanitise their hands before and after the service – we’d recommend establishing a    sanitisation point at entry, e.g. hand sanitiser
• Have tissues available for clients, and follow Government guidelines for sneezing, coughing and disposing of them appropriately
• Use disposable sheets, or change and wash them after every meeting
• Ensure ventilation of rooms before and after each booking – ensure a minimum of 25 minutes between each client, to give time for cleaning and ventilation of spaces
• Ensure staggered arrival times so that clients do not have to wait together in the same area
• Clean and sanitise any hard surfaces (or surfaces you and the client may touch) after every booking e.g. door handles, surfaces in bathrooms and rails in corridors or stairwells

Use personal protective equipment (PPE)

The Government guidance urges everyone working in close contact services to use PPE, where social distancing is not possible. This helps to reduce the transmission of the virus where sex workers may be exposed to an individual for an extended period of time. The Government recommends:

• Wearing a clear visor that covers the face and provides a barrier between the wearer and the client from respiratory droplets – there is no obligation for the client to wear this, or other face coverings if you are
• If using a disposable visor, dispose of it in a safe way and wash your hands thoroughly before touching your face
• If using a reusable visor, sanitise it in a safe way, where you do not come into contact with any of the droplets that may be on the visor, and again wash your hands thoroughly after
• Wear gloves during any meeting, again minimising the risk of transmission
• Close fitting goggles may also be used as an alternative to a clear visor, but only when worn with a Type II face mask

Support test and trace

Government guidelines require all close contact premises, such as hairdressers and spas, to keep customer contact details for up to four weeks for contact tracing purposes. This means that if you or a client develops symptoms of coronavirus, those you’ve had contact with can be tested and their contacts traced to stop the spread of the disease.

The Government requests the following information is collected as part of the Test and Trace guidelines:

• The name of the customer or visitor. If there is more than one person, then you can record the name of the ‘lead member’ of the group and the number of people in the group
• A contact phone number for each customer or visitor, or for the lead member of a group of people
• Date of visit, arrival time and, where possible, departure time

The Government regulations now stipulate that close contact premises must collect the details of customers and visitors. This includes:

• Advising visitors that this information will only be used where necessary to help stop the spread of COVID-19
• The accuracy of the information provided will be the responsibility of the individual who provides it. Venue operators do not have to verify an individual’s identity for NHS Test and Trace purposes
• If a customer or visitor says that they do not want their details shared for the purposes of NHS Test and Trace, they can choose to opt out, and if they do so venue operators should not share their information used for booking purposes with NHS Test and Trace

We’d encourage all our users and their customers to also download the NHS COVID-19 app, which was recently released. This will help support NHS Test and Trace and stop the spread of the virus.

 

Local lockdowns

As you will be aware, localised lockdowns have been enforced across many regions of the UK, where infection rates are higher than national averages. 

You can find a full list of the places where local lockdown restrictions are in place here: 

• • England
  • Scotland
  • Wales
  • Northern Ireland

If you are working in these areas, you should follow the guidance set out on the websites above and take extra safety precautions to stop the spread of the virus.

Following the above advice should help you to stay safe whilst operating your business during the current pandemic. We encourage everyone to adhere to this as best they can. Stay safe.