City centre hotels hammered by Covid restrictions on travel
Hotels located in city centres are “really struggling” as Brits pick resorts over cities and travel restrictions curb tourism.
Most hotels in British resorts like Cornwall are full, but city centre hotels are only between 30 and 40 per cent booked, according to data from hotel technology provider Avvio.
London has seen a 32 per cent increase in bookings in the last two months, compared with 31 per cent for the UK as a whole, but it is struggling mainly due to the lack of tourists visiting the capital.
Just 12 per cent of those searching ‘greater London hotels’ are from outside Europe, according to Avvio’s data, which would typically be much higher.
Avvio chief commercial officer Michael De Jongh urged British holidaymakers to consider having a UK city break.
“With the UK’s resorts pretty much full up for the summer months there’s been some overspill into city centre hotels,” he said. “But with no inbound international travel many of them are still really struggling.”
The government has come under increasing pressure from those working in the travel industry to change course and reopen international travel.
Protests against travel restrictions are taking place today outside the House of Commons, as well as outside Holyrood and Stormont.
The UK’s traffic light system for travel has proved so controversial that Ryanair, Stansted airport owner MAG, Tui and British Airways are taking the government to court over it.
The lack of tourists entering the country then has a knock-on effect in cities like London, leading to hotels, restaurants, pubs and entertainment suffering and struggling to pull in profit.
Hotel cancellation rates in the UK are currently extremely low at around 4 per cent, but De Jongh fears if international travel is opened up, UK cancellation rates could reach 40 per cent.
“It’s not just about people booking both a hotel abroad and one in the UK,” he continued. “There’s also a growing trend of booking rooms at multiple UK hotels, and then cancelling all but one at the last minute. This causes incredible problems for hotels, in precisely the same way as multiple restaurant bookings did during Eat Out To Help Out.”