Asda and Marks & Spencer have both implemented further in-store initiatives designed to keep staff and shoppers as safe as possible during the coronavirus outbreak.

Measures include limiting the number of customers allowed in shops at any one time and markers on the floor to ensure social distancing and the installation of protective screens at checkouts.

Asda greeters at store entrances will manage the flow of customers and make hand sanitiser available, and the grocer has asked shoppers to use cashless payment if possible.

Asda has also become the latest grocer to install Perspex screens to minimise contact between employees and customers at checkouts, pharmacies and service desks.

In a message to shoppers, Asda chief executive Roger Burnley said: ”We’re working hard to protect you and our colleagues – please help us to do so by following the guidelines in place. My colleagues in our stores are working under incredible pressure to serve you – and I am hugely grateful to them for their efforts. Please be kind to them when you visit us - we’re all in this together.”

Marks & Spencer has also put greeters at the front of its shops, put two-metre distance markers on floors, has built time into staff shifts to enable them to wash their hands every half hour and has asked customers not to scan their Sparks loyalty cards for the time being.