The virus. PPE. Part 1

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nilagin said:
Do you know for a fact they aren't going to be paid though? Or were you just told they had asked for volunteers?
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Please re-read my original post:


Uncle Fester said:
I see that Boots and Amazon have been described as ‘commercial partners’ by the government with regard to the proposed testing.

I know as a matter of fact that Boots staff (and this includes normal retail staff not just pharmacy employees) have been asked to volunteer their services for this endeavour.

I can’t see that it is right to use unpaid staff if they’re making a profit out of this. Unless of course, it’s so that they have no liability if the staff become infected?

Or have I totally misunderstood the meaning of ‘commercial partner’ ?
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Just to be absolutely clear, as I previously said,the staff are furloughed and are currently being paid the 80% from the government and Boots are paying 20% to top up wages to normal earnings. This will not change if they volunteer to do the testing. So they can stay at home and be paid £X or they can go and do the testing and be paid £X.

I am aware of this because I know that this is a request made by a line manager to his staff. Unsurprisingly the response has been poor.

As I mentioned in my post, is the voluntary status simply a means to remove company liability, in the event of staff becoming infected?
 
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Uncle Fester said:
No, this is to do the tests i.e. actually performing the swabbing . They were told that they would be shown how to do the swab and would be provided with PPE. These are staff who are currently ‘furloughed’ from their normal work.
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I checked this thinking it was Boots working for Amazon but it seems that the tie-up is re Boots selling home-test kits and Amazon delivering them. Unless I've misunderstood the posts ..
https://pharmaphorum.com/news/amazon-and-boots/
 
JohnC6 said:
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On a lighter note can anyone tell me how to delete a half-written post prior to posting. ? :)
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Delete it all in your editing/posting window, replace with a single character (I use a dot), then post it, then instead of editing it use the delete button.
 
Uncle Fester said:
Please re-read my original post:




Just to be absolutely clear, as I previously said,the staff are furloughed and are currently being paid the 80% from the government and Boots are paying 20% to top up wages to normal earnings. This will not change if they volunteer to do the testing. So they can stay at home and be paid £X or they can go and do the testing and be paid £X.

I am aware of this because I know that this is a request made by a line manager to his staff. Unsurprisingly the response has been poor.

As I mentioned in my post, is the voluntary status simply a means to remove company liability, in the event of staff becoming infected?
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Just to be absolutely clear, I read your original post, it doesn't matter whether you underline, write in bold, you could even write it in capitals, Volunteer doesn't necessarily mean unpaid, it can mean you have chosen to do it rather than being told to do it and your original post did not make that clear. You appeared to be struggling with that concept, hence why I asked if you had been told categorically that it would be unpaid.
 
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For Amazon at least I'd assume it's the home blood test kit for antibodies to a previous infection, unless they are going to issue the delivery drivers with swabs. And since they can't reliably find my neighbour's house, I'd be sceptical about their ability to locate my nasopharynx.
 
nilagin said:
Just to be absolutely clear, I read your original post, it doesn't matter whether you underline, write in bold, you could even write it in capitals, Volunteer doesn't necessarily mean unpaid, it can mean you have chosen to do it rather than being told to do it and your original post did not make that clear. You appeared to be struggling with that concept, hence why I asked if you had been told categorically that it would be unpaid.
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How obtuse can you be?

When I say I know something as a matter of fact, it means precisely that. That is why I put it in my original post.

If you failed to understand that from my original post, that is due to your lack of comprehension and not a lack of clarity on my part.

Or do you just like to be argumentative?
 
MatBin said:
Delete it all in your editing/posting window, replace with a single character (I use a dot), then post it, then instead of editing it use the delete button.
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Not entirely sure this is what’s wanted but if I want to delete a comment before posting (due second thoughts etc), I select all and delete the text and then post it — you get an ”Oops some mistake” which you clear and the post is gone.
 
Retune said:
For Amazon at least I'd assume it's the home blood test kit for antibodies to a previous infection, unless they are going to issue the delivery drivers with swabs. And since they can't reliably find my neighbour's house, I'd be sceptical about their ability to locate my nasopharynx.
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Oh, I don’t know, I find Amazon really gets up my nose sometimes :).
 
Uncle Fester said:
How obtuse can you be?

When I say I know something as a matter of fact, it means precisely that. That is why I put it in my original post.

If you failed to understand that from my original post, that is due to your lack of comprehension and not a lack of clarity on my part.

Or do you just like to be argumentative?
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Tip. I’ve found it’s easier to outside and bang my head on the wall rather than tying to ‘assist‘ Neil @nilagin :( , less painful too :).
 
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sphexx said:
if I want to delete a comment before posting (due second thoughts etc)
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As I only do this when I realise I'm going to post a complete nonsense I just leave it in the buffer in the hope it will remind me to think next time! :naughty:
 
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simon ess said:
I just delete the text then refresh the page.

I should probably do it more often TBH.
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I don’t think that works, the text reappears under some circumstance with the possibility you will post it in error :(. My experience in Safari, iOS 13, maybe it varies with OS/browser/device?
 
Uncle Fester said:
How obtuse can you be?

When I say I know something as a matter of fact, it means precisely that. That is why I put it in my original post.

If you failed to understand that from my original post, that is due to your lack of comprehension and not a lack of clarity on my part.

Or do you just like to be argumentative?
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Uncle Fester said:
I see that Boots and Amazon have been described as ‘commercial partners’ by the government with regard to the proposed testing.

I know as a matter of fact that Boots staff (and this includes normal retail staff not just pharmacy employees) have been asked to volunteer their services for this endeavour.

I can’t see that it is right to use unpaid staff if they’re making a profit out of this. Unless of course, it’s so that they have no liability if the staff become infected?

Or have I totally misunderstood the meaning of ‘commercial partner’ ?
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All I asked for was clarification of the fact it was unpaid. You stated they wanted volunteers.

Then you mentioned the right to use unpaid staff. When I pointed out that people can volunteer to perform a function and get paid for it. Your subsequent answers have just reinforced my original impression that you may have misconstrued what the word volunteer actually meant.

Saying the response has been poor still doesn't mean the function is unpaid, if the staff are on 100% pay anyway, it could just be that a high proportion of employees would rather stay at home with their families, rather than putting themselves and their families at risk.
 
AndrewFlannigan said:
As I only do this when I realise I'm going to post a complete nonsense I just leave it in the buffer in the hope it will remind me to think next time! :naughty:
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Possibly you write nonsense less often than I do ;). In my case I think it’s usually when I make a jokey comment and then think it may upset the recipient, I am known for being a sarcastic b*****d, though it’s never my intention :).
 
Just had a message from work, may not be going back on the 20th April as originally planned, could be extended until the 4th May.
 
nilagin said:
Just had a message from work, may not be going back on the 20th April as originally planned, could be extended until the 4th May.
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I don't think I'll be going back at all, just started a 2 week "holiday" (and as I'm self employed I wont be getting paid, by anyone.)
 
nilagin said:
All I asked for was clarification of the fact it was unpaid. You stated they wanted volunteers.

Then you mentioned the right to use unpaid staff. When I pointed out that people can volunteer to perform a function and get paid for it. Your subsequent answers have just reinforced my original impression that you may have misconstrued what the word volunteer actually meant.

Saying the response has been poor still doesn't mean the function is unpaid, if the staff are on 100% pay anyway, it could just be that a high proportion of employees would rather stay at home with their families, rather than putting themselves and their families at risk.
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Could you kindly do me a favour please?

Could you never ever respond to one of my posts again?

I'm not a primary school teacher and I have neither the skill or the patience required to simplify things to the degree you obviously require.

Under the current circumstances, I'm concerned for for my physical health. I don't need my mental health threatened as well.

I really appreciate you complying with my request - thank you.
 
MatBin said:
I don't think I'll be going back at all, just started a 2 week "holiday" (and as I'm self employed I wont be getting paid, by anyone.)
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It's cases like your that make me feel we should replace all the benefits and allowances with a Universal Basic Income. My theory is that it would actually be cheaper on a national scale because there would be far less administration involved. It would also be a much fairer system all round.
 
AndrewFlannigan said:
It's cases like your that make me feel we should replace all the benefits and allowances with a Universal Basic Income. My theory is that it would actually be cheaper on a national scale because there would be far less administration involved. It would also be a much fairer system all round.
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As I said in another post, I made enough profit over the last few years to put aside money for a rainy day, I'm not looking for any hand-outs. But thanks. OAP next year anyway, so I'll sponge off the State then. :)
 
AndrewFlannigan said:
It's cases like your that make me feel we should replace all the benefits and allowances with a Universal Basic Income. My theory is that it would actually be cheaper on a national scale because there would be far less administration involved. It would also be a much fairer system all round.
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I think HMG has missed a trick here in not going for UBI instead of various handouts to people & industries. One of the ideas behind UBI is that the un/under-employed would start new businesses. Most of the enforced stay-at-homes are under-employed but many/most of them already have the skill/contacts to start new enterprises (online particularly) and may have been already thinking/daydreaming about doing just that.
 
AndrewFlannigan said:
It's cases like your that make me feel we should replace all the benefits and allowances with a Universal Basic Income. My theory is that it would actually be cheaper on a national scale because there would be far less administration involved. It would also be a much fairer system all round.
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I was under the impression that self employed could claim upto £2.5k dependent on their previous years income, the same as employers can claim for their furloughed employees.
 
nilagin said:
I was under the impression that self employed could claim upto £2.5k dependent on their previous years income,
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What they say you can do, and what can do in reality are two totally different things.
My son is still jumping through hoops, so much so, he thinks he's a circus dog, and still not getting paid for it ...
 
MatBin said:
I'm not looking for any hand-outs.
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I don't see UBI as a handout but as a more efficient alternative to tax allowances, benefits and loopholes. By giving every adult citizen enough money to live (if used sensibly) we can do away with a complex and generally unfair social welfare and tax system. Every citizen would then pay tax on all their income without exception and my theory is that would be one step towards a fairer society and a wealthier one.
 
MatBin said:
As I said in another post, I made enough profit over the last few years to put aside money for a rainy day, I'm not looking for any hand-outs. But thanks. OAP next year anyway, so I'll sponge off the State then. :)
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Amazing isn’t it? If you give a few quid to a human it’s a handout, if you give a few 100k to a farmer it’s support, if you give a few billion to a bank it’s .... well I don't what they call it, but I call it daylight robbery :).
 
sphexx said:
Amazing isn’t it? If you give a few quid to a human it’s a handout, if you give a few 100k to a farmer it’s support, if you give a few billion to a bank it’s .... well I don't what they call it, but I call it daylight robbery :).
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Joking aside, a good friend of mine runs the village pub and also runs a stocktaking business within the pub trade. Now he has had to close his doors, his other pub customers have closed theirs he nothing coming in. He went to his bank to try and sort out a government loan/grant as suposedly laid out by the chancellor last week(?) . His bank has told him he does not qualify for a government loan but he can have a standard bank business loan at an extortionate interest rate. It's nice to know that the banks, as always, are looking after themselves rather than those that bailed the bastards out a few years ago.
 
mex said:
It's nice to know that the banks, as always, are looking after themselves rather than those that bailed the bastards out a few years ago.
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To be fair to the banks they're in an invidious position. If they lend to borrowers, who they should have known would be unable to repay, neither the FCA nor the Bank of England will be very pleased with them. If they don't lend they're seen as ungrateful swine by the taxpayers who bailed them out in the past.

This is the point at which the government, in the form of the Treasury, should be making big changes to our tax and benefits systems to prevent the economy crashing. Unfortunately the government is in the midst of an acrimonious divorce from the EU which has made Britain a less than attractive debtor in a world that is just about to hit an economic brick wall.

We need the far sighted and decisive actions of a Franklin Roosevelt but instead we have the blind stumbling of Boris Johnson and Donald Trump. This does not look good. :(
 
AndrewFlannigan said:
To be fair to the banks they're in an invidious position. If they lend to borrowers, who they should have known would be unable to repay, neither the FCA nor the Bank of England will be very pleased with them. If they don't lend they're seen as ungrateful swine by the taxpayers who bailed them out in the past.

This is the point at which the government, in the form of the Treasury, should be making big changes to our tax and benefits systems to prevent the economy crashing. Unfortunately the government is in the midst of an acrimonious divorce from the EU which has made Britain a less than attractive debtor in a world that is just about to hit an economic brick wall.

We need the far sighted and decisive actions of a Franklin Roosevelt but instead we have the blind stumbling of Boris Johnson and Donald Trump. This does not look good. :(
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I was under the impression that government CV-19 loans are underwritten by the government and therefore not putting the banks at any risk?
 
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mex said:
I was under the impression that government CV-19 loans are underwritten by the government and therefore not putting the banks at any risk?
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I just saw a report on SkyNews by a reporter who said he’d investigated it thoroughly and it wasn’t the banks’ fault but hasty regs, sorry didn’t listen to all the details.
 
JohnC6 said:
I think you're being a tad harsh. If Kim Jong Un says there hasn't been a single COVID-19 death in his country than that's good enough for me and I say this becauseDonald Trump said he's a man of his word. :)

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...-new-years-eve-impeachment-2020-a9266226.html
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I would imagine that Kim Dong Dung, is lining up firing squads for the virus and their hosts, ensuring that no one in NK actually dies of COVID-19 but a rather bad case of ‘lead poisoning’ ...
 
Uncle Fester said:
I would imagine that Kim Dong Dung, is lining up firing squads for the virus and their hosts, ensuring that no one in NK actually dies of COVID-19 but a rather bad case of ‘lead poisoning’ ...
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Well, as I read the BBC report posted by Dave that very same thought went through my mind too.
 
Have we seen the figures on sales of hand cream? If people are washing their hands correctly there should be an uptick in sales :).
 
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