Hospitality worst hit sector for supply issues
Figures from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) found while 46.2% of businesses asked about availability of materials, goods or services in the past two weeks, said they had been able to get what they needed, 11.4% had to change suppliers or find alternative solutions.
A further 9% stated they had been unable to get the materials, goods or services they required over the past fortnight.
The accommodation and food service activities industry reported the largest percentage of businesses indicating stock levels being lower (27%).
Sector-wide issues
This comes after warnings pubs should prepare for a lack of chicken supplies as a result of Brexit and the ongoing ‘pingdemic’.
Following reports casual dining chain Nando’s was forced to close a number of outlets in order to restock supplies, Lynx Purchasing said the supply of poultry will impact the UK market and pub sector.
While the ONS statistics also showed 95.2% of the accommodation and food service activities were currently trading, 3.1% had permanently ceased trading and the remaining 1.7% had temporarily closed or paused trading.
The research also looked at financial performance and found 45.4% of accommodation and food service businesses had seen turnover drop while almost a quarter (24.7%) had seen no impact on turnover from 26 July to 8 August. A further 17.6% saw turnover rise while 12.3% were unsure.
Debt obligations
When it came to Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme, which is set to end next month (September), the majority of the hospitality workforce are now off the scheme with 9.7% still on full or partial furlough.
Some 80.6% are mainly worked at the same place they were working before the pandemic while 3.4% are now working from home and 1.6% were either on sick leave or not working due to coronavirus self-isolation or quarantine.
The research went on to find out how confident businesses were that they will meet their debt obligations.
For the hospitality sector, almost 68% showed levels of confidence the debt obligations will be met while 7.5% cited they had ‘low or no confidence’ and a quarter (24.5%) were unsure.
