COVID-19 DILEMMA; A Case in Analysis of business problem

Session 17 and 18 was very interesting one. Most people in the class were observed to be highly interested in the case. Was it the experience that many people had during the pandemic period? Was it that people witnessed similar incident in their organizations or elsewhere? I kept asking myself.

 However, most people wanted to be involved in the class discussion during the session including myself who rarely gets involved or finds it difficult opening mouth on a discussion like this ordinarily. But I made several attempts by raising my hand to at least contribute my own understanding as other students were passionately contributing. Some of whom I have never seen participate in a class discussion like this.

When I was reading the case, the story was reflecting a similar incident that occurred in our organization and coincidently, it is a manufacturing company. The reason I really wanted to contribute.

It was the case of Intext, a manufacturing company in Nigeria. Like Intext many organizations did not prepare for such unexpected and unfortunate events. Therefore, the disease was not included in the insurance policy cover. About three staff that were affected by the disease treated themselves and send requests to claim a refund of N200,000.00. this amount was the cost of treating Nigerian staff. Meanwhile, the expatriates were registered under the international insurance program and the terms required that all their bills should be covered by the organizations they are working with at the time. The cost of treating each expatriate was 1.2 million naira.

Doyin, the HR manager was confused as he started receiving the letters and notification from some of the affected staff, asking for a refund. Although, he has two options:

1. To refund the claims of N200,000 to the staff
2. Not to refund the claim.

That is the dilemma; should Doyin approve the refund or not, bearing in mind the possibility that many staff might send their claim as well? What if he did not approve, what would be the reaction of the rest of the workforce? According to the case, the workforce has a union, and the union may react badly in such a way that may affect the operation of the company.

Well, during the session, people reacted differently. Some believed the claims should not be refunded. being the reason that the costs are not in the budget, that Doyin has no authority to approve only the board of directors can approve, and so forth.

On the other hand, those who opined that the claims should be settled, believed that is it the responsibility of the company to treat its staff fairly. Since the expatriates are given due consideration. Then, they should find a way of including it in the policy. different opinion from different people.

The facilitator, however, warned that it’s not the final decision that matters but how depth is the analysis. considering all criteria as well as the consequences of each before making a decision.

the purpose of writing this blog is not to analyze the case anyway, but to highlights some of the actions taken by my organization when faced with similar case, and thus:

1. The first few staff reported been admitted for Covid-19, the company immediately requested for the bill and settled.
2. Concurrently, the company used one of its properties as an isolation center to prevent the spreading of the virus among staff and their families.
3. Contracted a qualified medical team for testing and treating Covid-19. Where the sickness became severe, the patient will be transferred to a Government hospital.