It comes as no surprise our industry has and will be affected by the ongoing concerns over the COVID-19 corona virus. Business to business interaction, including sales calls, conferences, trade shows and international travel are essential to the economic health of machinery and manufacturing. However, these initiatives are being curtailed to protect the public from the proliferation of the virus.
Higginson Equipment Inc. is dedicated to the health and well-being of not only our cherished family and team, but to our customers and suppliers as well. Being a place of manufacture, Higginson Equipment is not capable of work from home programs to isolate team members from the spread of the virus. Higginson Equipment is open for business as usual unless the state of the pandemic changes for the worse.
However, Higginson Equipment Inc, and our divisions of EconoMAX and Amtec Hydraclamp Inc, in which office and plant are one and the same, has enacted stringent health & safety policies and procedures to ensure the spread of the virus does not occur under our roof.
Besides postponing business travel outside of the country, Higginson Equipment has put in place the following measures to prevent the internal spread of the COVID-19 corona virus:
- Training of and mandatory hand washing using the World Health Organization recommended method
- Daily sterilization of all common contact surfaces in the office, kitchen, bathrooms and shop using medical grade wipes
- No handshaking or high fives
- Mandatory hand sanitization upon entering the building, entering our kitchen and prior to all punch clock interaction
- All light switches left on and doors left ajar, where possible, to prevent surface contact opportunities
- Training of and mandatory requirement of approved cough and sneeze methods (into the elbow only, followed by immediate hand washing)
- Removal of lids covering garbage containers
- Restriction of eye, mouth and nose touching, and if essential, followed by hand washing
- Removal of all shared plates, cups and cutlery; team members are now required to bring, use, clean and take home their own food service items
- Banning of shared food items, unless individually served by a sanitized member of the JHSC
With these measures, Higginson Equipment Inc. believes we are doing our part to reduce the already small odds of workplaces viral transmission. Nobody knows the extent of this dynamic and fluid pandemic, but if everyone takes responsibility for their own health, we're confident collateral cost of the COVID19 corona virus will be minimized.
Please take care,
Josh Cosford
VP of Sales and Marketing
Higginson Equipment Inc.