How the Betsy Hotel Addressed Strict COVID-19 Mandates

Challenge

Comply with Miami Beach reopening orders

The Betsy Hotel needed a solution to proactively monitor employee health status to prevent shutdowns. Miami Beach had specific reopening orders and emergency measures for restaurants and hotels. These establishments could only reopen if they implemented employee symptom screening, observed social distancing, wore masks, and had every employee and vendor tested monthly. If someone tested positive, an employee or a vendor, the hotel had to shut down the affected area, or the entire operation, depending upon the location of the exposure and the general vicinity where that person worked. In order to reopen, the Betsy Hotel had to do a thorough cleaning and remain closed for 10 days or, incur the expense of testing everybody again.

Without ReturnSafe, employees would have to report to work, complete their health check-in at the security office, and depending on their health status stay at work or go back home. Manual processes such as these cause unnecessary delays, are error prone, and inefficient. The process also places a burden on hotel administrators as managers have to consistently contact the security office to know who is coming to work.

Solution

Rapid response and containment for community safety and continuous operation

Malvin Ortiz-Aponte, Director of Human Resources at the Betsy Hotel, wanted a solution that would help keep their community safe and maintain continuous operations without having to test everyone all the time. The Human Resources team evaluated their options and decided that they needed a software solution for employee screening and contact tracing for rapid response and containment.

Director Ortiz-Aponte liked the ease of use of the app and that their team could set the policies and recommendations to come to work or stay home based upon local, state and federal guidelines.”The entire screening process takes about 5 seconds per day for our employees” With ReturnSafe’s end to end solution, employees can easily check-in and perform their daily symptom survey before reporting to work. Additionally, vendors can check in quickly at security prior to entering the facility.

“Without it [ReturnSafe] we would have to continue to rely upon employee adherence by good faith,” said Ortiz-Aponte. ReturnSafe allows HR to monitor which employees are completing the screening. HR can quickly gain insights across the organization and monitor hot spots and exposures for rapid incident response.

They chose ReturnSafe primarily because the platform was comprehensive and affordable. “I liked that we could get everything we need from one organization, and the pricing was also a big motivator for buying ReturnSafe,” said Ortiz-Aponte.

ReturnSafe’s solution also stood out because of their mission and values. “I really like the background of the company, it started from a nonprofit and is now a Public Benefit B Corp,” said Ortiz-Aponte. “They started the company not for profit but to help people. That was very attractive to me.”

Results

Quickly monitor exposures across the organization

By choosing ReturnSafe, the Betsy Hotel doesn’t have to staff a person at the security desk and free up managers’ time. Employees can do their health screenings from home, prior to commuting to work, and will receive a recommendation immediately. Through our Screening dashboard, managers can easily see the status of their team and who is cleared to report to work.

Without these precautionary steps the Betsy Hotel would have had to test everyone if someone became positive or risk having to shut down to abide by Miami Beach Mandates. ReturnSafe has enabled the Betsy Hotel to maintain business operations amidst unprecedented circumstances.

“I really like the ease of use of the app for our employees, and HR can quickly see across our organization to monitor exposures and hot spots for rapid incident response.”

Malvin Ortiz-Aponte
Director of HR | Betsy Hotel