Business West Sussex
Our Business West Sussex website provides COVID-19-related:
- business support and advice
- information about grants and funding
- workplace guidance.
National lockdown: Stay at home (Level 5)
On Monday 4 January the Prime Minister announced a national lockdown. To reduce social contact, its regulations require some businesses to close, and imposes restrictions on how some businesses provide goods and services.
The businesses required to close include non-essential retail, hospitality venues, accommodation, leisure and sports facilities, entertainment venues, personal care facilities, community centres and halls. Other businesses and venues are permitted to stay open, following COVID-19 secure guidelines.
You can find the full list of these businesses in the guidance on closing certain businesses and venues in England.
GOV.UK advice for businesses
See GOV.UK for further advice and support, including:
- up-to-date guidance for employees, employers and businesses on Coronavirus (COVID-19) business support
- specific guidance for working safely during Coronavirus (COVID-19) for all kinds of workplaces
- guidance for food businesses on Coronavirus (COVID-19)
- a package of measures to support businesses and the self-employed through the impact of COVID-19 on the Self-Employment Income Support Scheme
- instructions to anyone responsible for a business or organisation on what to do in the event of one or more confirmed cases of coronavirus in your organisation through Public Health England's useful workplace action cards.
Test and Trace
It is a legal requirement for certain businesses to collect NHS Test and Trace data. We encourage all businesses and organisations with a physical location open to the public to create official NHS QR code posters to display at their venue entrances. This will help support contact tracing.
NHS COVID-19 app users can scan the poster as they enter a venue. This means that if people visit your venue and later test positive for Coronavirus, other app users who were there at the same time may be sent an alert, if local public health teams think this is necessary.
- You should create and display a QR code if you are a business or community organisation with a physical location that is open to the public.
- If you have more than one venue, you need to create a separate QR code for each location.
- The app notification will not mention the name of your venue; it will just let app users know that they may have come into contact with Coronavirus and provide them with public health advice.
See GOV.UK to find out how to create your NHS QR code poster.
Keeping records
To support NHS Test and Trace, GOV.UK also offers guidance on maintaining records of staff, customers and visitors.
The following templates will ensure you keep accurate contact detail records to support contact tracing if it becomes necessary.