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Service Encounters at Food and Beverage Outlets During Malaysia's Movement Control Order (Mco)

Service Encounters at Food

and Beverage Outlets

During Malaysia's

Movement Control Order

(Mco)

By Zulaikha binti Ab Rahman

All company facilities will be shut down, except for businesses

such as pharmacies and convenience stores that offer daily

needs.

Prime Minister of Malaysia (PM), Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin declared on 16 Mac 2010, a movement control order

(MCO). The Movement Control Order (Malay: Perintah Kawalan Pergerakan), usually referred to as the MCO or

PKP, is a cordon sanitaire introduced by Malaysia's federal government in reaction to the country's COVID-19

pandemic on 18 March 2020 as a prevention measure (Bunyan and John, 2020).

MCO implies that all company facilities will be shut down, except for businesses such as pharmacies and

convenience stores that offer daily needs. Nevertheless, during the MCO, all government and private premises

would be closed, except for essential services such as utilities, telecommunications, transportation, banking,

health, pharmacies, ports, airports, cleaning, and food supplies.

However, a dine in was not allowed during the period. At that time being, most of the restaurants does not

welcome dine-in customers following the government's decision that restaurants are permitted to service such

patrons under the conditional. Food and beverages are needs for all people in the world regardless of its social

status or even in any situations like MCO.

Thus, during MCO customers are only able to order through drive-through, takeaway and delivery, as it has been

announced by PM. Most of the food outlets and restaurants cannot yet invite customer back to dine-in as

Malaysians' health is their highest priority. By improving their delivery systems, companies who need to be

physically present to function like restaurants and cafes would now have to consider alternatives to remain viable

during MCO where most of the operators have successfully strengthen its delivery services.