April 2020
Our most difficult month, with Ongoing Revenues falling by just over 12%.
COVID-19
Executing our response to the pandemic.
Crisis, recovery and strategic opportunities phases.
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COVID-19
An outstanding response from our organisation
Our approach to managing the COVID-19 crisis in 2020 was to address the challenge through three phases: 1. the Crisis phase; 2. the Recovery phase; and 3. the Strategic Opportunities phase.
COVID-19 response – Download this sectionCrisis phase
Essential services
Essential service status secured for our key businesses.
+£100m
Cost savings secured and c.£400m of cash preservation measures, suspending our M&A and dividend programmes.
250
Colleagues contracted COVID-19.
3
Sadly, 3 colleagued passed away in 2020 due to COVID-19.
28,000
Days lost due to lockdowns / self-isolation by frontline colleagues.
2
Extended Executive Leadership Team meetings held each week to manage the crisis and maximise opportunities.
Collective group sacrifice to protect colleagues, people and support our financial stability
We took decisive actions, moving 8,500 back-office colleagues to home working and implemented strict protocols and additional PPE for frontline technicians.
Around 40% of colleagues were affected by pay waivers, suspension of bonus payments and the Company’s LTIP scheme, international employee support schemes and temporary lay-offs.
Colleague support fund
We recognised that COVID-19 created many challenges for our colleagues and their families, so a Colleague Support Fund was established. Funds from RentokiI Initial Cares, our charitable fund, together with a voluntary salary waiver by the Chief Executive of 65% of his Q2 salary (having already waived 35% as part of the Company’s response to the pandemic), and from salary or director’s fee waivers by several of the Board and a number of senior managers, were used to support colleagues, principally in South Africa and Asia.
Recovery phase
7,000
In less than a month, we trained and equipped around 7,000 colleagues to carry out Disinfection services across 60 countries – protecting customers’ staff and their own customers.
276
Local events held in 2020 #sharethelove
Demonstrating our values and commitment to the communities we serve
We held 276 local events in 2020 to publicly thank health and other public sector workers, donating, amongst other things, Disinfection services to emergency services, pest control treatments to care homes and sanitiser packages to hospital staff.
An app to track the health and location of colleagues was developed in house and deployed
Returning colleagues to work by the end of Q3
The temporary pay waivers put in place in Q2 for 5,080 of our managers ended at the end of June and by 30 September, virtually all colleagues had returned to work.
£600m
In the second half of 2020, the Company was able to repay the £600m borrowed under the Bank of England’s Covid Corporate Financing Facility.
17x
During 2020 we increased the supply of hand soaps and sanitisers – particularly of no-touch dispensers – to meet demand from customers, which was 17x the level of 2019.
Strategic Opportunities phase
Long-term change in attitudes towards the importance of hygiene
The COVID-19 crisis has generated a long-term change in attitudes towards the importance of hygiene, bringing an increased focus on hand, surface and air hygiene, as well as tighter regulation, higher standards and increased usage of hygiene products and services around the world.
20
New Hygiene markets
We have accelerated our expansion of Hygiene services to meet customer needs, launching in 20 new countries in 2020, including Latin America, EMEA (Belgium, Germany, Jordan, the Netherlands, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the UAE) and the USA.
Strength of our brands
We expect ‘trust’ to be a big social theme following the pandemic and our investment in training, innovation, and digital; and our responsible business practices will continue to set the Company apart.
Rising and sustained demand for Hygiene products
We continue to innovate and launch new products to meet increasing hygiene needs, particularly no-touch and digital products as well as hand, air and surface hygiene solutions.
Expanding our digital range
Post -pandemic, we expect customers to require more digital services, which can provide remote monitoring and greater insights and reporting as well as offering a more sustainable solution.
The pandemic will provide a potential springboard for increased digital hygiene services.
Crisis phase
April 2020
Our most difficult month, with Ongoing Revenues falling by just over 12%.
2
Extended Executive Leadership Team meetings held each week to manage the crisis and maximise opportunities.
Essential services
Essential service status secured for our key businesses.
Collective group sacrifice to protect colleagues, people and support our financial stability
We took decisive actions, moving 8,500 back-office colleagues to home working and implemented strict protocols and additional PPE for frontline technicians.
Around 40% of colleagues were affected by pay waivers, suspension of bonus payments and the Company’s LTIP scheme, international employee support schemes and temporary lay-offs.
+£100m
Cost savings secured and c.£400m of cash preservation measures, suspending our M&A and dividend programmes.
250
Colleagues contracted COVID-19.
3
Sadly, 3 colleagued passed away in 2020 due to COVID-19.
28,000
Days lost due to lockdowns / self-isolation by frontline colleagues.
Colleague support fund
We recognised that COVID-19 created many challenges for our colleagues and their families, so a Colleague Support Fund was established. Funds from RentokiI Initial Cares, our charitable fund, together with a voluntary salary waiver by the Chief Executive of 65% of his Q2 salary (having already waived 35% as part of the Company’s response to the pandemic), and from salary or director’s fee waivers by several of the Board and a number of senior managers, were used to support colleagues, principally in South Africa and Asia.
Recovery phase
7,000
In less than a month, we trained and equipped around 7,000 colleagues to carry out Disinfection services across 60 countries – protecting customers’ staff and their own customers.
An app to track the health and location of colleagues was developed in house and deployed
276
Local events held in 2020 #sharethelove
Returning colleagues to work by the end of Q3
The temporary pay waivers put in place in Q2 for 5,080 of our managers ended at the end of June and by 30 September, virtually all colleagues had returned to work.
Demonstrating our values and commitment to the communities we serve
We held 276 local events in 2020 to publicly thank health and other public sector workers, donating, amongst other things, Disinfection services to emergency services, pest control treatments to care homes and sanitiser packages to hospital staff.
£600m
In the second half of 2020, the Company was able to repay the £600m borrowed under the Bank of England’s Covid Corporate Financing Facility.
Strategic Opportunities phase
Long-term change in attitudes towards the importance of hygiene
The COVID-19 crisis has generated a long-term change in attitudes towards the importance of hygiene, bringing an increased focus on hand, surface and air hygiene, as well as tighter regulation, higher standards and increased usage of hygiene products and services around the world.
Rising and sustained demand for Hygiene products
We continue to innovate and launch new products to meet increasing hygiene needs, particularly no-touch and digital products as well as hand, air and surface hygiene solutions.
20
New Hygiene markets
We have accelerated our expansion of Hygiene services to meet customer needs, launching in 20 new countries in 2020, including Latin America, EMEA (Belgium, Germany, Jordan, the Netherlands, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the UAE) and the USA.
Expanding our digital range
Post -pandemic, we expect customers to require more digital services, which can provide remote monitoring and greater insights and reporting as well as offering a more sustainable solution.
The pandemic will provide a potential springboard for increased digital hygiene services.
Strength of our brands
We expect ‘trust’ to be a big social theme following the pandemic and our investment in training, innovation, and digital; and our responsible business practices will continue to set the Company apart.
In an extraordinary year, we have continued to deliver record levels of colleague safety, training and retention, and our leadership in innovation and digital has contributed to our underlying success in Pest Control and Hygiene.
On behalf of the Board, I would like to thank all of our colleagues for their outstanding response this year. It is their commitment and sacrifice that has ensured that Rentokil Initial moved quickly from the Crisis phase to Recovery, and is now able to explore fully the opportunities presented to us in a post-vaccine world.
Andy Ransom
CEO