Third of venues to reduce Christmas opening hours due to vacancies

A third of hospitality businesses plan to reduce opening hours over Christmas as they face a shortage of applicants for vacancies, according to UKHospitality, while 32% have already been forced to reduce their opening hours. 

In addition, it was also revealed that more than a third of businesses (35%) plan to simplify menus and 13% have reduced opening days, all because of staffing shortages.

As a result, UKH is calling on the government to implement a ‘two-phase’ approach to tackle the issue, with changes to the immigration system and reforms to the Apprenticeship Levy. 

The hospitality body has also suggested the expansion of the Youth Mobility Scheme to include EU member states and reviewing the Shortage Occupation List to “accurately” reflect the state of the labour market. 

It also suggested abolishing the Immigration Skills Charge and reforming the Apprenticeship Levy to include a proportion of funds being made eligible for use on non-apprenticeship training and improving the operation of apprenticeship system.

Kate Nicholls, chief executive of UKHospitality, said: “This edition of Future Shock is incredibly timely because workforce challenges have unfortunately become a fixture for hospitality businesses. We are facing a systemic problem that has persisted for years and it needs urgent attention from the government.

“The statistics in the report lay bare the real-life impact on businesses and consumers as a result of not having enough staff. It’s so disappointing that businesses are having to go to such lengths such as simplifying menus and reducing trading hours to deal with this. It’s also doing the consumer a disservice, limiting choice and availability.”