FOCUS MAINTENANCE
CONTINUOUS SERVICE Throughout the current crisis the maintenance of hard FM services has
remained crucial. Tom Absalom, Managing Director at JCA describes how
maintenance and engineering services have continued in times of COVID-19
The pandemic caused by the
global spread of the Coronavirus
has presented immense challenges
to society, and within that the
responsibilities and activities of those
operating commercial o ices and other
places of work. As an engineering
company, JCA has been having to adjust
to a new, evolving set of requirements,
some of which are not supported by
industry guidelines but based on our
own learning and interpretation, such is
the speed with which the impacts of the
pandemic have unfolded.
The government’s advice was, in the
first instance, quite clear. Work from
home if you can, if you cannot work from
home then go to work. This a ected our
clients in di erent ways. Those operating
commercial o ices that supported a
workforce that could viably work from
home went from bustling working
environments to an eerie stillness quite
literally overnight. The support of those
buildings from a building engineering
perspective could not, however, stop.
36 NOVEMBER 2020
MAINTAINING BUILDINGS IN TIMES OF
LOW OCCUPANCY
The requirements for maintenance
activities continued throughout
the initial lockdown phase,
tasks such as those detailed
in SFG20(i) Red covered the
statutory requirements of the
building systems. Building
owners were advised to liaise
with their insurers to understand
what levels of building attendance were
required to maintain their insurance cover.
Where clients took a more long-term view
on building occupation, we have been
able to refer to the SFG30 Mothballing and
Reactivation standard(ii) recently updated
by BESA(iii) (Building Engineering Services
Association).
In addition to the statutory requirements
for maintenance continuing, the hugely
reduced occupancy for commercial o ices
required further considerations such as
the secondary risk of legionella caused by
stagnation within building water systems.
Increased maintenance regimes were put
in place to increase levels of flushing, and
water storage capacity was reduced to ensure
a constant turnover of water. Testing was
increased to ensure that water quality was
monitored and maintained. These activities
maintained the safety of the water system but
also mitigated the risk of extensive remedial
works when buildings were put back into
operation. Another element that was common
across our a ected client base was the
adjustment of environmental control systems
to make sure that the building e iciency was
optimised for the occupancy level.
PREPARING FOR THE RETURN OF STAFF TO
A COVID SECURE WORKPLACE
The return of sta to their place of work
represented a significant challenge for
our hard FM teams and we played a role
supporting our client’s sta communications.
Heightened levels of sta anxiety induced
by the pandemic had to be addressed with
clear messaging that was, as far as possible,
supported by visual change. Signage,
screening, and sanitiser stations were all