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Tuesday, June 16, 2020Hoteliers
request to relax hotel
and beach restrictions for tourism By the A.M. Costa Rica staff The Costa Rican Chamber of Hotels asked the government on Monday to authorize hotels to operate to the maximum of their accommodation capacity. According to the Chambers, they need to allow more guests and maintain the common areas such as restaurants or other meeting points at 50% of their capacity. The use of all the rooms of a hotel does not represent a risk since these spaces are used by families, social bubbles, or single guests, said the Chamber. The Chamber proposes that management in charge of reservations control the permanence time of its clients. In addition, in the specific case of swimming pools, strict control would be maintained to ensure the minimum distance between people, following the guidelines ordered by the Ministry of Health for these types of activity. "What we are requesting is that no maximum capacity percentage limits be established for lodging establishments with the guarantee that the common areas will be maintained at 50% of their capacity or respecting social distancing, as appropriate, complying with the guidelines and health protocols,” said Javier Pacheco, representative of the Chamber. "This measure would benefit, mainly, the country's small hotels." In addition, the Chamber calls on the government to extend the beach hours because this would facilitate managing the flow of people in the hotels at specific times. Hotels won’t fill up until borders reopen, including air travel. The Chamber requests the government to determine a definitive date to reopen air borders, because "there is great uncertainty and the sector requires this responsible opening," said Pacheco. "We understand that there is a particular situation with land borders, but what we ask is that we are told, clearly, when we will be able to resume international arrivals by air, we want to avoid a new wave of cancellations, some airlines announced that they will resume the flights to the country in July and international wholesalers, too, require knowing exactly when our borders will open since many have plans to travel next month, but without that clarity, we cannot plan the recovery," Pacheco said. The government ordered border closure until June 30. A benefit for hotels is the proposed bill of tax reduction under analysis in the Congress. Last week, the deputies of the Economic Affairs Commission approved the analysis of the bill No.21934, which proposes to suspend the mandatory entry payment of the Value Added Tax, IVA, for the tourism sector until 2021. According to Congress, the bill proposes to extend the grace period for two years in the Public Finance Strengthening Law regarding the entry into force of the collection of the IVA tax on the tourism sector. The current law requires tourist entrepreneurs to collect a 4% VAT tax from July 1. In 2021 the tax will rise to 8 percent. Starting 2022 the tax will rise to 13 percent. This temporary suspension of the tax will not have a direct impact on the finances of the Ministry of Finance, said the deputy Roberto Thompson who presented the project in Congress. After this approval, bill No.21934 will be presented to the deputies for the first round of voting. After two rounds of voting, Congress will determine the approval or rejection of the bill. The Chamber of Tourism celebrated the progress in the bill that could suspend the VAT tax. "We hope to have the support of the rest of the deputies," said Rubén Acón, president of the Chamber. ----------------------------- Should the government lift restrictions to support the tourism sector? We would like to know your thoughts on this story. Send your comments to news@amcostarica.com More
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