COVID-19 Task Force

Employer Policy/Consideration Checklist – Pandemic Plan

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Access a pdf here.

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Initial Planning

• Organize a planning team
• Designate an executive team member as point person

Recruiting and Hiring

• Make arrangements for remote interview options
• Develop exposure screening questions for in-person interviews
• Train employees on safety protocols (e.g., no shaking hands, communications with recruits)
• Train employees to avoid bias against national origins related to high-risk areas
• Understand the scope of permissible pre- and post-offer questions related to exposure
• Reduce or eliminate temporary hiring

Education and Awareness

• Inform employees about how to prevent spreading disease
• Advise employees to stay at home when sick
• Place posters to reinforce messages (see, e.g., the Centers for Disease Control’s printable materials)
• Advise caution regarding shaking hands

Environment

• Maintain supplies of hand sanitizer and disinfecting wipes
• Frequently clean and disinfect doorknobs, counters, light switches, other touch points
• Perform specialized cleaning of areas where any infected employee has been

Visitors and Onsite Vendors

• Request information regarding recent travel
• Request information regarding symptoms related to COVID-19
• Understand and utilize permissible screenings
• Implement remote work policies for onsite vendors
• Restrict nonessential visitors

Workplace Presence

• Develop or expand voluntary work-from-home policies
• Develop mandatory work-from-home policies
• Consider issues for non-exempt employees (e.g., no required pay for time not worked)
• Consider how to respond to employees who refuse to report to work or attend events due to exposure fears
• Utilize teleconferences or videoconferences instead of in-person meetings
• Minimize or eliminate nonessential events
• Eliminate any requirements for a doctor’s note to justify an absence

Workplace Function

• Plan for absence coverages
• Plan for reassignment of essential duties
• Arrange for staggered work schedules where possible
• Establish temporary succession planning
• Establish contingency plans for temporary workers
• Plan for the redistribution of duties

Travel

• Implement inquiries regarding personal travel to affected areas
• Restrict nonessential business travel
• Develop provisions for employees who become ill during business travel
• Consider investing in (additional) business travel insurance

Evaluation of Employees

• Prepare a script (jointly with legal counsel) for inquiries regarding symptoms
• Consider (jointly with legal counsel) taking temperatures in event of pandemic
  Communicate policies with employees in advance
• Send home employees with symptoms
• Prepare a script for communications with coworkers who have been exposed
• Send home coworkers who have been exposed
• Identify a procedure for self-reporting exposure by travel, family member, etc.
• Do not request health records from the group health plan or make disability inquiries

Leave Policies/Procedures

• Identify flexibility in leave policies
• Consider expansion of eligibility for approved leaves

Compensation

• Understand payment requirements for exempt employees
• Understand payment requirements for non-exempt employees
• Consider paid time off when employee is not otherwise PTO eligible
• Determine pay policies for quarantined employees

Group Health Plans

• Consult with legal counsel regarding any disclosure of an employee’s health information (see the Department of Health and Human Services’HIPAA bulletin)
• Consider expanding access to HIPAA-compliant telehealth services
• Consider and consult an employee benefits attorney regarding waiving cost-sharing requirements for testing
• Consider expanding coverage for off-formulary prescription drugs in the event of supply shortages
• Understand and plan for the repercussions of coverage loss due to quarantine or workplace shutdown for plans that base eligibility on hours of service
• Consider to what extent expatriate employees may need additional coverage

Other Employee Benefits

• Review contracts with employee benefits vendors for force majeure clauses and governing law that permits reliance on a doctrine of impossibility or frustration
• Consult employee benefits counsel to determine whether a hardship distribution to an affected employee is permissible under your 401(k) plan
• Anticipate changes in 401(k) plan investment options or deferral elections given market volatility

Immigration

• Review where expats are located on assignments and consider if they should be moved back to home countries
• Review visa expiration dates and determine if those visas will be able to be timely renewed in light of limited consulate services and/or limited travel policies
• Review international assignments scheduled for the upcoming months and determine if they will be able to proceed
• Consider H-1B required wage compliance if “benching” employees
• Consider H-1B required wage compliance if H-1B workers request time off

Union Issues

• Consider whether any policies or changes require bargaining
• Coordinate with union representative to discuss contingency planning

Layoffs and Shutdowns

• Understand legal prohibitions on employee termination (e.g., FMLA, USERRA, ADA approved leaves)
• Prepare for potential WARN Act implications
• Determine required and discretionary severance for employees
• Determine required and discretionary continuation of health care benefits (e.g., COBRA)
• Outline a plan for bringing employees back to work