As Aer Lingus pilots begin to ballot on a 17.75 per cent pay increase on Thursday, one of Dublin’s leading hotels has revealed that it took a €55,000 financial hit to its room turnover as result of the recent flight cancellations.
Members of the Irish Air Line Pilots’ Association (Ialpa), part of trade union Fórsa, will vote between Thursday afternoon and the morning of Tuesday, July 23rd, on the Labour Court’s pay proposal which was recommended last week by Ialpa’s executive. The pay increase would be paid over the next four years.
In an interview with Inside Business, a podcast by The Irish Times, Buswells Hotel general manager Paul Gallagher said the hit amounted to about half a week of normal trading for the property. The hotel is situated on Molesworth Street opposite Leinster House, Dublin 2.
“That was really from European routes,” he said. “People knew one of their flights would get here but they weren’t sure about the return leg. So what was the point of coming to Dublin for a two-night break if you were going to be stuck for a third because you can’t get out?
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“So people just decided not to come to Dublin and I’d say €55,000 [was lost] in cancellations over about three weeks. Now I’m a small hotel with 67 rooms but if you multiply that across 20,000 bedrooms in hotels in Dublin, you’re probably talking about €20 million to €25 million worth of business vanished. On a very good week, this hotel would turn €110,000 in bedroom turnover. So it’s half a week’s trade.”
Mr Gallagher said the hotel couldn’t replace this lost business.
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Aer Lingus cancelled 573 flights from June 26th following a work to rule by pilots in the dispute over pay.
Meanwhile, Paul Donnellan, the owner of Gemelle’s Restaurant in Galway city, said that while the number of customers from North America had been strong this summer there had been a “challenge” in terms of visitors from Europe as a result of the Aer Lingus flight cancellations. “The North American market are coming in on different airlines, not all travelling with Aer Lingus but there definitely has been a challenge with the European market.”
Mr Donnellan said the restaurant’s turnover was still down 30 per cent on pre-pandemic levels, because half of the venue is mothballed because of recruiting difficulties. “At the moment, we only have 50 per cent of the restaurant open so turnover is easily 30 per cent down on what it was in 2019,” he said.
“We rarely open the upstairs part of the restaurant because we don’t have the staff to run it.”
If it was open, would he be able to fill it with customers?
“One hundred per cent, seven days a week. On Quay Street [in Galway], in the space of 100m, you’ve got 22 restaurants, bars and hotels. Every single one of them is looking for staff.”
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