John Lewis will begin to reopen its shops for customers as part of a gradual approach from Monday 15 June, starting with its Poole and Kingston department stores, followed by 11 others on Thursday 18 June. Depending on the response from customers and Partners to new ways of operating with respect to social distancing, more shops will open throughout the summer. The decision follows the Government's guidance earlier this week on easing restrictions for non-essential retailers.

Learning from the social distancing measures the Partnership has taken in Waitrose shops, John Lewis plans initially to open just under a quarter of its shops as part of a steady, gradual approach with rigorous safety and social distancing measures in place. Branches selected to open have been chosen primarily because of their accessibility by car.

As John Lewis takes the first steps in reopening its doors for business, a raft of measures will be introduced into its shops drawing from the Partnership's experience of applying and managing social distancing in its Waitrose supermarkets and from within the delivery and warehousing aspects of its e-commerce businesses. These include;

• The introduction of a "Customer Service Host" assigned to welcome customers into the store and answer any questions while managing customer numbers, queues both at entrances and busy areas of the shop and explain to customers what changes they might see in store.
• Reducing the number of shop entrances.
• Caps on the number of customers entering stores.
• Prominent social distancing signage.
• Protective screens at checkouts and areas of the shop where 2 metre social distancing cannot be achieved between customers and Partners.
• Control procedures for escalators and lifts limiting the number of users.
• Rigorous and frequent cleaning.
• Provision of hand sanitiser for customers to use at all entrances.
• Social distancing in back of house areas.
• New contactless payment limit of £45.
• Limiting the number of additional customer services - for example close-contact beauty services will not be offered and customer catering outlets and fitting rooms will remain closed until further notice.
• Safe and simple returns process - for example inline with government guidance we are going to separate returned stock from new or old stock for 72 hours.

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