What’s Your COVID-19 Staff Travel Policy?

This week, TraveLaw Online’s Doug Crozier and Tim Law of Heifetz, Crozier, Law respond to a question from an agent asking for help offering guidance to a corporate client asking about staff travel.

Q: One of our larger corporate accounts has asked us for guidance on what it ought to do about the staff travel part of its business, as things ramp back up.  Can you help us to answer the client’s question?

A: Many of these points were relevant pre-COVID-19, but something like this will at least give you a framework for your response to your corporate client:

• Decide what your corporate policy will be on post-travel quarantine by staff, and let us know what it is, so that we can help to honour it.
• Decide who within the Company will enforce that policy (and authorize exceptions???) and let us know, so that we can liaise with him/her.
• Review in detail the entirety of the Company’s Travel Policy, with an eye to the COVID experience and its lessons, in order to identify possible changes to it.
• Review your existing insurance coverage for staff when travelling on business, and decide if it already covers pandemic-related claims.
• If not (and even if it does) decide if you need to revisit the existing coverage with an insurance specialist.
• Regardless, figure out how the Company’s insurance policy fits with each employee’s personal coverage (if applicable), and the province’s Workers Compensation rules.
• To what extent can we, as your TMC, assist in this?
• Advise us if any of the above might impact our contract with you, so that we can together discuss the impact on our relationship.

If you have a question, you can contact Crozier or Law at info@hclaw.com or connect with Bob Mowat at Canadian Travel Press/Baxter Media at bobmowat@baxter.net.

Heifetz, Crozier, Law is a Toronto law firm that has for years represented all aspects of the Canadian travel industry. The lawyers at HCL also maintain a non-travel practice, covering litigation, real estate, Wills, corporate/commercial matters, etc. To contact HCL, e-mail info@hclaw.com.