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COVID-19 & Your Water System – FAQ

Posted on March 18, 2020 120Water

Back

We understand that this is a difficult and unprecedented time for everyone, which is why we wanted to answer questions for our customers and the industry at large regarding COVID-19.

Our FAQ is broken into 2 sections:

  1. General Industry Questions
  2. 120Water Customer-Specific Questions

We recommend bookmarking this page and checking back frequently. 

  • You may submit additional questions here and we will do our best to answer within 24 hours.
  • Our Center of Excellence team (Erica Walker and Tom Bruns) will continue to update this FAQ as we gather new questions from the industry, our customers, and thought leaders.

In addition, we have several resources in the works. 

We’re working to launch the first of many virtual webinars to tackle the issues associated with operating in this new virtual environment.

*******

Webinar: March 27th 
Adjusting to the new normal in light of COVID…How Your Water System Needs to Adapt

During this webinar we covered several of these key areas of uncertainty. 

You can view the webinar replay here.

COVID-19 – Industry Questions

Key Concerns & Answers
**Please note – we are doing our best to answer these questions given the information currently available. As we learn more, our responses may be updated.

    • Will the EPA will be making modifications to compliance and reporting deadlines?
      • The ASDWA team and EPA are imminently meeting to discuss monitoring flexibility for all SDWA rules. However, as you await guidance from regional EPA offices, we encourage your utility to do all it can to meet current compliance deadlines. Our COE team is also reaching out directly to all State Drinking Water Administrators as well.
    • Should we expect delays in mailing our samples? Any idea how long delays will be? 
      •  At this time we do not anticipate any delay in mailing or analysis of 120Water kits. If you are managing your own kits and laboratory coordination we encourage you to check with your partners.
    •  Are labs still open and analyzing samples?
      • Yes, 120Water partner labs are currently operating and we do not expect any delays in turnaround time for analysis. We will keep you updated if anything changes.
    •  Are we safe to send people to collect samples from someone’s home or check lead service line materials in the home?
      • According to the CDC and other health officials, minimizing direct human interaction and empowering the resident to take their own sample or self identify material type is recommended at this time. Please contact us for ways we might be able to help you maintain operations virtually.
    •  Is it safe to send a sample kit into someone’s home? Is there risk of virus transfer?
      • The WHO and CDC have stated that the likelihood of catching the COVID-19 virus by touching cardboard or another shipping container is very low. For more information on how vendors/carriers are taking extra precautions, here is the official response from USPS.

COVID-19 – Customers of 120Water

Your safety is our top priority. As such, we are taking many precautions around COVID-19 while we remain virtually open for business and ready to provide guidance and assistance to you.

Abiding by CDC recommendations that protect our public health and keeping our business fully operational are our top priorities. Here are the actions we are taking:

COVID-19 Preparedness

  • We have limited all non-essential staff and visitors from our fulfillment center. With the exception of 2 key employees on our fulfillment team, all other staff are working virtually and visitors are not allowed in that facility.
  • We are maintaining active conversation with our supply chain (vendors, USPS, etc) as well as lab partners to project any possible disruption in product and/or turnaround times. So far we do not believe or anticipate this to be an issue and we have plenty of product on hand to withstand months of disruption.
  • We are also a call away from CDC and other experts that are advising us on a daily basis.

Open for Business to Serve You

  • We are personally connecting with each customer to see how they are doing and how else we can be of service during this time.
  • We are also looking into how some of our virtual field and other communication capabilities might be able to help your operations stay on track during this time. 

Additional Resources

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