Businesses have until noon today to display the government's Covid Tracer QR code at their doors or reception areas before it becomes mandatory.
Shosha retail assistant Deepika Mammai Photo: RNZ/ Katie Todd
By yesterday there had been more than 234,000 QR posters generated, but app users said some doctors clinics and retirement villages were yet to make the sign-in option available.
On Colombo Street in the Christchurch suburb of Sydenham - home to coffee shops, clothes stores, banks and beauty parlours - RNZ found 17 of 20 businesses had the government's QR poster, usually accompanied by a pen and paper contact tracing alternative.
For most businesses, it was a recent addition. Shosha retail assistant Deepika Mammai said her store added the poster last Wednesday when Auckland went into lockdown.
"On that day we got instructions from our head office that we should put up QR codes," she said.
Among the three which didn't have the government's official QR code on display, one menswear store was still relying solely on pen and paper, claiming most of its customers don't have smartphones - but it promised to have the code up by lunchtime.
The other two, a sushi store and a dairy, couldn't say if they would also meet the deadline.
The number of customers using the app varied between stores, with Pure Hair & Body owner Pip Adams impressed to see all her clients scanning in.
"Everyone's doing it. We've got a back door as well, so they're doing it on the way in and some of them are checking and signing in [on paper] as well," she said.
Yet at the busy Sydenham bakery, owner Cheryl MacGibbon said the customers ducking in and out through the strip curtains were rarely stopping to scan.
"I haven't seen anyone use it to be perfectly honest," she said.
Elsewhere in the country, the gaps in the government's QR code rollout appeared to be wider.
RNZ has heard from multiple people who say their local doctor's clinic doesn't have a way to sign in.
Tauranga resident Adam Hughes was one, and he was also concerned to see no QR code at a nearby retirement village he visits as an essential worker, delivering Meals on Wheels.
"They've got to be some of the most important places to actually track. At doctors people who think they might have Covid are going to be tested. Then you've got the residential rest homes where they need to know if anyone has been there... those are some of our most vulnerable people," he said.
Pennylane Records manager Garry Knight Photo: RNZ/ Katie Todd
On Colombo Street, Pennylane Records owner Garry Knight encouraged all businesses which hadn't got on board yet to do so.
"Everyone should be part of it. It will make it so much easier if and when we have a problem, then obviously it's easy to trace people. Especially in areas like this. A lot of people come to Sydenham and do their shopping and then go away so it would be good to be able to trace," he said.
The Ministry of Health will be announcing how it will police the QR codes later this week.
It said it would take a "pragmatic approach" to businesses which didn't meet today's deadline of 11.59am, but continued breaches could incur a fee of $300 or a court fine of up to $1000.
Coffee Zone owner Sandra Skurgiss has a QR poster on display but she didn't think business owners should be fined for non-compliance.
"Why should there be? Everyone has a personal responsibility for their own life. It's up to them how they decide to handle it," she said.
By 1pm yesterday afternoon, Director-General of Health, Dr Ashley Bloomfield said nearly 1.5 million people, or 37 percent of the population, had downloaded the NZ Covid Tracer app.
QR codes can be generated through a link on the Ministry of Health website.
