Do I Legally Have to Use Track and Trace
An overview of NHS Test and Trace, including what happens if you test positive for coronavirus (COVID-19) or have had close contact with someone who tests positive. If you have access to the Internet, please log in to the NHS Test and Trace website. This is the easiest way to give you the information you need. These rules apply when NHS Test and Trace informs an employee that they are: they are only available for jobs that have been approved to participate in the DCT Workplace programme. The term “contact tracing app” can have a number of different meanings in different scenarios. There are apps like the one in China that are mandated by the government and ask a number of questions about the person`s health and recent travel, and also track all the person`s movements. At the other end of the spectrum, there are apps that simply provide a notification when a person is within six feet of a person who tests positive for Covid-19. If an employee is required by law to self-isolate and cannot work from home, employer: If one of your employees is informed that they are legally required to self-isolate through NHS Test and Trace and that they must work in a place other than their place of self-isolation, they are required by law to notify you as soon as possible, before coming to work next time. Otherwise, a fixed fine of £50 may be imposed on the employee. Employees who are required by law to self-isolate due to COVID-19 are eligible for the PHC for each day of work missed during their self-isolation period, provided they meet the eligibility criteria.
In addition to the EEOC`s federal guidelines, some states may also have applicable data protection laws. For example, California has the Consumer Privacy Act (CPA), for which the California Attorney General just submitted final regulatory proposals on June 1, 2020. According to the California CPA, consumers have various rights regarding personal information collected by a company, including the right to disclose the information to be collected, erasure (upon request) of the information collected and free from discrimination for the exercise of these rights. Similarly, the Illinois Biometric Information Protection Act (BIPA) may impose reporting and record-keeping obligations on employees or application developers themselves. Employers with employees in these and other states with similar laws should therefore ensure that these rights are communicated and exercised by employees. Employers should consult with their own legal counsel before advocating the use of contract tracking apps and try to work with the app developer to the extent possible to ensure that such laws are reflected in the app technology through disclosures, warnings, acknowledgements, and consents. If NHS Test and Trace identifies you as a contact, you are not exempt from self-isolation and you work in a critical ward where asking you to self-isolate would impact the provision of that critical service, your employer will need to inform the local Health Protection Team (HPT) for a risk assessment. There have already been privacy issues with Test and Trace. The Times reported that some contact trackers shared private information about patients, such as NHS numbers in WhatsApp and Facebook groups. Other reports have also claimed that contact information is used to harass women. If you have not tested positive but have been identified as a close contact, your employer must call the Self-Isolation Service Centre on 020 3743 6715 to provide your contact information.
You will then receive your NHS test and trace ID. The legal obligation to self-isolate does not apply if you have received a notification from the NHS COVID-19 app, but we encourage you to do so anyway. A close contact is a person who was close to someone who tested positive for COVID-19. Workers can be in contact at any time from 2 days before the onset of symptoms by the person who tested positive, or before the date of their LFD or PCR test if they had no symptoms, and up to 10 days after. This is when the virus can be transmitted to others. Finally, and in this context, many individuals, companies and governments are working to develop contact tracing applications. Therefore, employers may have to make a difficult decision as to which app is best from which developer. This decision comes with taking into account the risk of choosing incorrectly and accidentally opening employee information to data mining or fraud. The guidelines have been reformulated for clarity.
In addition, there is a new section on collecting customer and visitor data for NHS Test and Trace. The following information has been added to the “When an employee develops symptoms and orders a test” section: If an interaction between 2 people took place via a plexiglass screen (or equivalent), this is not considered sufficient contact. Contact tracers will not consider wearing personal protective equipment (PPE) as a mitigation measure when assessing whether a recent contact was likely to have risked transmitting the virus. Given these guidelines, perhaps one of the most compelling reasons to use contact tracing apps to reduce and manage COVID-19 hazards in the workplace is the arguably flexible and efficient technology itself.
