During this unprecedented time, First Choice Group are working hard to support our customers and the nation's frontline services. This page will be updated regularly with the latest developments are information about what actions we are taking in response to the Coronavirus (Covid-19) situation. Be assured that we have taken necessary steps to ensure the continued operation of our business, including implementing a home working strategy and significant investment in further stockholding. Details can be found below.

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First Choice Group Coronavirus Update from John Whitehouse, MD – 5th November 2020

We hope that you and your families are safe and well in these increasingly challenging times. As we head into another National Lockdown in England and varying regional restrictions in Wales, Scotland & Northern Ireland, the health & safety of all our staff, customers, partners and suppliers is paramount. We want to thank you for your continued support throughout this most unprecedented of years. First Choice Group, as ever, remains fully operational, including our training centre, throughout this current lockdown period. We have implemented further health & safety measures to support the educational training needs of our customers, including full NHS Track & Trace capabilities on site, for additional peace of mind. Working with our OEM manufacturer partners, we continue to increase UK stock levels to cater for demand for all major OEM brands of parts, accessories & cleaners. Our transactional web site can process orders up to our new 7pm cut off time, for same day despatch (Mon – Fri). As ever, our dedicated customer experience teams are on hand to help with your enquiries between 8.30am - 5.30pm Monday to Friday. This includes our Trade Counter, which remains open for orders and collections during this period. We will continue to update you as and when more government details are announced and more information & updates can be found on our web site and social media channels. Stay safe all and together, we will beat this. Kind regards John & The Team

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Coronavirus Update from John Whitehouse, MD – 13.08.2020

Firstly, I would like to thank our customers for their continued support and the positive feedback we have received during these challenging times. Let’s be honest, at the start of 2020, who could have foreseen that the trends in our industry would change almost overnight with the closure of all UK pubs, restaurants, hotels, cafes, fast food outlets to name but a few. Several weeks’ later, we were still unable to eat or drink out and only recently with the ease of lockdown are we seeing a slow upturn, as customer confidence grows to venture out into the ‘new norm’ – whatever that may be! We have never experienced a time when something has had such a huge impact on our industry, truly unprecedented times with nothing to compare. Let’s hope that we have now passed the peak of this pandemic and that the current recovery trend continues, so we can all journey back and see the green shoots of recovery grow. The reopening of pubs and restaurants regionally and leisure & retail establishments, all now appear to be gathering pace. Schemes such as the government's ‘eat out to help out’ launched from 3rd August, may also provide a much-needed boost for our industry. Further cause for optimism this summer may come from the UK holiday sector and linked catering operations, as demand for a summer UK holiday increases – we could all do with a holiday! Along with schools and a significant number of higher education institutes reopening fully in early autumn. The speed of this pandemic has caused problems for most businesses and as we navigate through this crisis, we too have had to streamline our operation and introduce new efficiencies to emerge stronger into the new normal. Sadly, this has resulted in us saying goodbye to a few of our team members and we thank them for their support and help on our First Choice journey. We want to assure you that there will be no compromise on the service we deliver and the strong relationships we have developed with our customers and suppliers remain our focus. We will continue to work closely with our manufacturer partners to offer a full range of genuine OEM parts for servicing / recommissioning equipment and planned preventative maintenance. We urge you not to compromise on the parts you purchase as genuine OEM parts give a greater guarantee of quality, reliability and efficiency and customers will need this assurance as they open their businesses too. Please contact our First Choice Customer Service Team or view our Webshop at www.firstchoice-cs.co.uk for further information. Furthermore, we are pleased to have successfully reopened our First Choice Training Centre on 1st July which continues to offer: Engineer Technical Training, ACS Gas Assessments and continuation of our Managed Learning Programme (MLP). Please do not hesitate to speak to Martin Dagnall and the team for more information or further details at www.firstchoice-cs.co.uk/training. We are now in the fifth month of working differently and adapting to the new normal and I continue to be hugely proud of our First Choice teams. Some of our team members are working from home and some are working at our First Choice offices and distribution centre. They are embracing our core values and continue to work with dedication, passion and commitment whilst going the extra mile during these challenging times. The health and safety of our teams, visitors and learners continues to be of paramount importance and we will continue to review the measures we have in place to safeguard all in the workplace. And finally, we may all need to function in a way not seen before as we emerge from this pandemic, but stronger together and perhaps more resilient in the process. Take care and stay safe. Yours sincerely John Whitehouse

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First Choice Coronavirus Update - 1st May

We hope that all of our customers and suppliers are keeping safe and well as we go into May. The safety of our team, customers and suppliers remains paramount as we continue with our safety measures. Maintaining these measures has enabled us to keep supporting our customers, in particular the healthcare sector during these unprecedented times. Our Trade Counter remains open for weekday collections with special measures in place to ensure the safety of our customers and staff. Our next day order cut off time of 5pm is continuing. Our Senior Leadership Team are carrying out strategic planning for the next stage, helping support the food service industry to increased output levels. We will publish more inline with any Government guidance and updates. Stay safe, from the First Choice team.

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Coronavirus Update from John Whitehouse, MD – 06.04.2020

We hope that all of you, your families and colleagues remain safe and healthy through these uniquely challenging times. As an organisation, we have been working with determination over the last few weeks to continue offering a service to our customers and the food service industry whilst continuing to balance the health and wellbeing of our teams. I would like to take this opportunity to thank our dedicated teams who are supporting you by working from home and our team back at base. In addition, those team members who are supporting us through the Furlough scheme at this time. I know many of our customers are being hugely affected by the Covid-19 outbreak, with Kate Nicholls (Chief Executive of trade association Hospitality UK) saying it was ‘catastrophic for business and jobs’ in our industry. We would like to further assure you that throughout all recent developments, we are still working hard to uphold the commitments we made to support you. Our stock holding continues to provide customers with a 90% + service level  following our investment in additional stock prior to the current situation. With passion and innovation, we will continue to find ways to help our industry come through these challenging times. Our latest unveiling is the launch of our new eCommerce website later this month which will make remote ordering and invoicing easier for both our trade and retail customers. Please be aware that we will be closed on Friday 10th and Monday 13th April for the Easter Bank Holiday, with normal service resuming on Tuesday 14th April. Again I would like to reassure all our customers that we are, as ever, providing our high levels of customer service and stock to the foodservice industry and all related health care sectors. Stay safe. John Whitehouse

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Coronavirus Update: A Message To Our Customers – 27.03.2020

These are challenging times for us all right now and we want to provide you with regular updates on the current measures we have in place. Please be assured that we are working hard to minimise the impact of this health emergency on the service we deliver whilst safeguarding our employees as a number one priority. First Choice are continuing business with a reduced operational team. Our sales teams are working from home to answer your calls and respond to emails, and we have a reduced team at base who are operating with strict ‘safety first’ controls (social distancing, hygienic best practice etc).

Service Update

• Our stock holding – continues to be strong to help minimise any disruption in supply with further purchase of key brands
• Couriers – are collecting from us as normal; however some timed services are not available
• Trade Counter – continues to be open for collections with additional hygiene best practice procedures

We will constantly review the measures we have in place to continue safeguarding our employees and enable us to continue support to our customers and the foodservice industry.

Key Contacts

Please see below contact details of our key management team available for you should you require any further advice/information at this time: Stay safe. John Whitehouse

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First Choice Training Announcement

23rd March 2020 Due to the ongoing global Coronavirus situation and for the health and care of our trainers and trainees, the First Choice Training centre is temporarily postponing all training activities until further notice. We have personally contacted all customers with existing bookings during this period. Our online booking portal will not be accepting any new bookings during this time. Championing Safety is one of First Choice’s Core Values, particularly at this unprecedented time. We thank you for your continued support and hope to resume our full programme of courses as soon as possible. Please contact the training team for more details or view updates via our news feed, on LinkedIn and Twitter.

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First Choice Group: Corona Virus Update

20th March 2020 At First Choice Group, our thoughts go out to all those who are being affected by the Coronavirus, and the effects of it. As a company, we are committed to keeping our customers, OEM suppliers and Team informed regularly of any significant updates. At this moment, it is business as usual at our Cannock headquarters as we continue to serve our customers and to reassure all with the following additional measures we have actioned;

• £400,000 worth of additional stock has been recently been purchased in contingency planning to enhance stock holding of business-critical supplies of OEM parts, accessories and consumables.
• We have introduced a phased working from home plan and worker isolations pods as of this week, and from next week we aim to have the vast majority of office workers working remotely where business possible.
• All non-critical business meetings have been postponed or moved to digital conferencing. Other meetings & visitors will be relocated to specialised suites with additional hygienic facilities to reduce extended contact.
• Our trade counter now has a special isolated collection zone with extra hygienic facilities in place, available for our customers to use.

  Our main priority continues to be keeping our Team and community as safe as possible which is why we have decided to introduce further measures to safeguard our employees, customers/suppliers and the operation of our business. These are precautionary measures that have been introduced in advance, so we are well prepared in the event of the outbreak escalating. We will continue to follow the guidelines set by HM Government and communicate regularly with updates as the situation changes. We are monitoring the situation regularly and our senior leadership team along with Parts Town are holding regular meetings to assess the circumstances and introduce further measures as appropriate. We would like to reassure all our customers that we are, as ever, providing our high levels of customer service and stock to the foodservice industries and all related health care sectors. First Choice Group has a duty of care for our employees and customers/ OEM suppliers and championing our core value of safety at this unprecedented time. For any further information about any of the points raised above, please contact your customer experience teams or visit our website. Thank you all for your corporation at this difficult time, your support and business are invaluable to us. Stay safe.

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Corona Virus Situation

11th March 2020 In the wake of the current Coronavirus situation, and although we have not seen any major disruption in supply chains as of yet, we are monitoring and reviewing the situation daily to ensure that our business is most suitably prepared. We have been putting into effect several contingency plans which will ensure the strongest possible outcome for our company, customers and suppliers – predominately increasing stock holdings amongst our partners and entire supply chain. Wherever possible, this up stocking process has already been in place and will continue to increase throughout this period. Our senior leadership team along with PT Holdings are taking guidance from our association partners FEA/CEDA and government experts to review further strategies should disaster recovery solutions need implementing. We wish to reassure all our partners of our ongoing commitment to the industry’s supply chain for OEM after-sales parts, accessories and consumables and thank you all for your continued support. Our working partnerships with all our OEM suppliers mean we are in constant communication and dialogue, should further contingency procedures need to be actioned. As a company well versed with the demands of international trade, we have every confidence in the skill and expertise of our staff and their understanding of procedures to be able to cope. Incorporating one of our key Core Values – Safety – we are instigating an enhanced health and hygiene best practices for all staff and visitors at our headquarters to help mitigate against potential risks. We will keep monitoring the situation to avoid disruption to our supply chains in your interest and we thank you in advance for your understanding and collaboration. Regular updates will be communicated should there be any significant change to the current situation. Further help and advice from the government can be found on this advice page.