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A number of people in Yorkshire have reported opening the Government’s Test and Trace phone app to discover they are supposed to be self-isolating but never received a notification.
People who have the app are being advised to open it to check they are not in a self-isolation period after some members of the public may have come into contact with someone who tested positive for Covid-19 but did not get an alert, text or email.
In some cases, this meant that people who may have been infected with the virus were going to work and using public transport.
Sarah Zahl, a postal worker in York, said a colleague opened their app and found they should have been self-isolating after potentially coming into close proximity with someone who tested positive, though they had not been notified.
Out of curiosity, she opened her app to find she was in the same situation, with the app showing she was supposed to be in a self isolation period.
This left her feeling “really worried” as she may have passed on the virus without realising, especially as up until then her app had been working normally.
She said: “Since my app says 10 days isolation left, I wondered straight away if it was originally 14, and it’s taken four days for me to see it.
“I was around town on Monday, and food shopping yesterday, what if I’ve passed something on?
“More worryingly though, I work for Royal Mail, I’m a postie, as is the person who originally led me to check my app, she’s a postie who has just tested positive for the virus. If we’re going to people’s homes and spreading it, that would be catastrophic.”
She said she is lucky as it is fairly easy for her to self-isolate and she has an understanding boss but she is concerned that people could be risking a fine because they do not know they are supposed to self-isolate.
She added: “I am wondering if I had been given a fine, how would anybody be able to tell if I’d seen the message or not, and if any fines given out wrongly in cases like this, have been revoked?”
Jack Thurland, from Leeds, contacted the helpline for the app after he received a notification earlier in the week and opened the app to find he had one day left of a period of self isolation that he knew nothing about.
He said he felt “confused, frustrated, gobsmacked”, especially as the test and trace system cost £12bn.
He said: “I just did what it told me which was for the rest of the day, no idea if it was right or if I should still be self isolating.”
He said he was “still at a loss” as to why he did not receive a notification sooner.
The app, which launched in September and has had more than 19 million downloads, has been fraught with problems since it was first introduced.
An error revealed by the Sunday Times last week meant many people were not aware they had come into contact with someone who had tested positive, while a couple of weeks ago people were receiving phantom alerts telling them to self isolate when they did not need to.
The Yorkshire Post has asked the Department of Health and Social Care whether the issues are connected.
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