Hotels ready to reopen today in spite of zero bookings

Bhubaneswar: After remaining shut for over two and a half months, a section of hotels in the state has decided to resume operations following the guidelines of Unlock 1.0.
“Around 30% to 50% hotels in the state are planning to reopen on Monday, with a limited number of staff. All guidelines issued by the state and the Centre will be strictly followed. No hotel has received any bookings so far but they have decided to resume operations in the hope of business. If the Covid-19 situation continues as it is, or worsens, the hotels that reopen may down shutters once more,” said J K Mohanty, chairman of Hotel and Restaurants Association of Odisha (HRAO).
On Sunday, hotels here were seen sanitising their premises and stocking up on equipment like masks and gloves. “There are no bookings yet, keeping the hotel closed is no solution. The virus is going to be with us for some time and we have to adapt to it. We have to develop a new system to cope with it,” said Pradipta Mohapatra, assistant vice-president, Mayfair Hotels and Resorts.
The hoteliers said hotel restaurants were yet to open for visitors. At present, they are only providing takeaways. Guests staying in the hotels can order food from the restaurants through room service only.
Request for room service and all other communication between guests and in-house staff should be through intercom/mobile phones. Hotels must adopt contactless processes like QR codes, online forms and use of digital payments like e-wallets for both check-in and check-out. These are among the measures issued as part of the standard operating procedure by the ministry of health and family welfare.
Although the hotel and hospitality sector has been very badly hit by the lockdown, some hotels have decided to wait before reopening. Hotel owners said most of the staff had gone back to their homes in villages during the lockdown. Some have refused to join the hospitality sector out of fear of contracting the virus.
“Since the number of Covid-19 cases is rising, staff fears about exposure to the virus are justified. We have decided to delay the reopening of the hotel for a few more days,” said Debasish Patnaik, director of The Crown here. Huge overheads, lack of bookings and staff shortage are the other reasons behind the hotels being circumspect about reopening.
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