OSHA, the Labor Department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration, issued an Emergency Temporary Standard (ETS) requiring U.S. private sector companies, including nonprofits, with 100 employees or more to develop a COVID-19 vaccination policy. As a part of this standard, tracking vaccination status and/or testing is a critical component. Utmost, the first Extended Workforce System (EWS), allows employers to track this information across the entire enterprise in a way no other vendor management systems can -- through our Worker app.

Built exclusively for Workday customers, Utmost allows enterprises to track, report, source, and manage spend for all categories of the extended workforce regardless of worker classification (i.e., contractor, project-based worker, outsourced worker, freelancer, independent contractor, etc.), whether employee or non-employee. Our investment, road map, and product strategy were built with Workday customers in mind and is foundationally worker-centric. 

The Utmost platform has something fundamentally different from point-to-point vendor management solutions. We’re delivering a network of participants. Each entity (enterprise, worker, supplier) has its own identity and tenant and can manage its data, workflows, and access, including sharing and storing critical information. 

In the case of the ETS mandate, workers can input, manage, and own their data (or allow their supplier to do so on their behalf) in our medical information section of onboarding. This information is controlled by Utmost, so the enterprise can decide if they want that information available in Workday, or if they just want to verify their entire workforce is compliant and store it in Utmost.

Employers under the ETS must have a manner to store and verify their workers’ vaccination status, such as a copy of their vaccination card, date of last COVID test, or a signed and dated employee attestation. Utmost helps organizations capture vaccination status and key details for non-employee talent who are working for them.

How does this impact non-employee labor?

While companies don’t need to count workers employed by staffing agencies or independent contractors into the 100 number, employers are recommended to confirm requirements are being met despite it not being legally required by the enterprise. Many of these workers are onsite, and companies want to know they, and the people they work around, are safe and protected. The goal of any organization should be adoption (in this case mandatory medical requirements), and a total workforce view to report and track compliance and minimize risk.

Utmost is unique in that our Worker app allows workers to fill out medical information, as well as other important onboarding information like background check and drug test results, diversity information, and other personal identifiable information (PII) that is owned by the worker themselves. The enterprise then can validate they are compliant and view, through our dashboarding functionality, the percentage of compliance across the enterprise. That designated verifier can’t download or store that information but has access to validate the vaccination criteria has been met.

How does this work in Utmost?

Utmost invites the worker to fill out onboarding information prior to beginning an assignment. In the case of vaccination information, a “Medical Information Required” section will prompt the worker to fill out and upload relevant information. 

The worker can then complete fields that may include:

• Document Type: Vaccination Card, Negative Test, Medical Waiver, Proof of Recovery
• Document itself (to be uploaded)
• Fully Vaccinated: Yes, No
• Date of First Dose (date)
• Date of Second Dose (date) 
• Vaccination Type 
• Attestation statement
• Vaccination waiver

Statuses of “Verified” or “Denied” can then be used as the condition in an exclusive gateway, either to continue onboarding the worker, re-assign the worker task, or terminate the worker requisition.

A few things to know about the ETS:

• Covered employers must implement vaccination policies by December 5, 2021
•  Employees must be fully vaccinated or begin regular testing by January 4, 2022
• OSHA can fine non-complying companies $13,653 for each violation of the standard
• Employers that willfully or repeatedly violate the standard can be fined up to $136,532
• OSHA’s rule will affect some 84 million private-sector workers across the country, including some 31 million who are believed to be unvaccinated.

Utmost is uniquely flexible and configurable because we know every organization is unique. Today, this means companies have a way to adhere to vaccination requirements that keep themselves, and their workforce, safe. That flexibility will be there in the future to help them remain agile, whatever the future brings. 

If you want to learn more about how Utmost keeps companies compliant, please reach out to sales@utmost.co.