Google has announced new perks for its employees based in the United States. The tech giant is now offering free weekly COVID-19 tests to its 90,000 employees. According to reports, all the employees of Alphabet-owned Google and its subsidiaries will be eligible for this. This will include YouTube. All these employees have to do is to sign up for the free-home tests. This is different from other big companies offering free COVID-19 testing. For example, Amazon is giving free access to COVID-19 tests to only those employees who are working in a physical location. So only those employees of the retail giant who are stationed at a retail location or warehouse are eligible for the free testing.
The tech giant has partnered with BioIQ to offer free COVID-19 testing to thousands of its employees. For each test, Google will give USD 50 to its partner. This will cost the company a total of USD 4.5 million per week when multiplied by the total strength of the employees in the United States. But this is something that will interest Google employees as the vendor’s website had crashed soon after going live. Google has promised its employees that they will get the test within two to four days after requesting it. The results will be delivered to them within two days once the lab will receive the sample.
The figure of USD 4.5 million is considering that every employee of the company avails this offer. A company spokesperson said that the company is recommending every employee to take advantage of the offer. The amount that Google will spend on this offer is nothing when compared to its profit margins. The company said that those working as interns with the company will also be eligible for the free COVID testing. A spokesperson said that the company will expand this to international employees in 2021. The company hopes that it will reduce the number of asymptomatic spreaders in case any of its employees gets infected with the coronavirus.
