Visits to restaurants only with contact details – naturopathy & naturopathic specialist portal

Corona loosening: catering businesses must store customer data

The various federal states have announced plans for how the anti-corona measures will be opened in the coming days and weeks. There are now also loosenings in the catering trade. As with visits to the hairdresser, customer data must also be saved when visiting restaurants.

Due to the spread of the corona virus, the restaurants across Germany have been closed for weeks – in many places the forced break is now over. The corona measures are relaxed and catering businesses are allowed to open again. Visiting restaurants is only possible under certain conditions.

Cautious easing of the previous editions

As long as there is no vaccine and / or medication for the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus-induced disease COVID-19, “physical contact restriction is the only effective way to keep the virus from spreading” , says a press release from the Lower Saxony Ministry of Social Affairs, Health and Equality.

Measures have therefore been taken in all federal states to contain the pandemic.

However, due to the currently stable infection rate with the corona virus, there are further cautious easing of the previous requirements and contact restrictions in Lower Saxony – as in other federal states.

In Lower Saxony, these apply from Monday, May 11, 2020.

Strict safety and hygiene requirements

The new “Lower Saxony Ordinance to Combat the Corona Pandemic” also provides for easing in the catering sector. Restaurants, pubs, snack bars, cafés and canteens are therefore also allowed to reopen for on-site consumption.

However, strict safety and hygiene requirements apply here, about which information is provided in a communication from the Lower Saxony Ministry for Economic Affairs, Labor, Transport and Digitization:

• Only a maximum of 50 percent of the existing seat capacity before the corona may be occupied during operation.
• Tables should be arranged at least two meters apart in the dining room.
• Guests are advised to make reservations in advance.
• Guests must provide their name and phone number as contact information for traceability.
• Mouth and nose protection is mandatory for the service staff, but not for the guests at the table.
• It is only served at the table. Only self-made dishes can be served in self-service. Operators and customers are obliged to ensure that a distance of 1.50 meters between customers for whom the current contact restrictions apply is maintained at all times.
• Buffets are not allowed.
• No items to be shared on the tables (no menus, spice racks, flyers, etc.).
• The distribution in the dining room should be such that guests cannot come into contact with the food on offer (for example, no salad islands in steak restaurants, generally no open kitchens).
• The guests are to be informed about the operational infection protection and the applied hygiene concept on a notice board.

The ministry points to a misunderstanding: the legal ordinance does not require a reservation in restaurants, but a reservation is strongly recommended.

Documented data must be kept for three weeks

The operator of a catering business must not only document the contact details of each guest, but also the time of entering and leaving the facility and keep it for three weeks so that any infection chain can be traced.

“If a guest does not want to provide their contact details, they unfortunately have to leave the catering business again. Guests can only be served if they agree with the documentation, ”says the message.

Similar regulations apply in other federal states; in some cases, however, the restaurants there may only open from next week. (ad)