Delhi hoteliers say business badly affected by COVID-19 fifth wave, people cancelling bookings

New Delhi [India], January 12 (ANI): Hoteliers in Delhi have been again hit by the fifth wave of COVID-19 in the national capital.
The hoteliers who were already dealing with the impact of previous waves of COVID-19 have started experiencing cancellations by the tourists.
Hoteliers claimed that their business had been impacted by approximately 50 pc as the tourist have again started cancelling the hotel bookings amid the rising cases of COVID-19, Omricron cases in the national capital.
"As soon as the weekend curfew started in Delhi, our bookings started cancelling. We are getting a lot of cancellations. We had 40 bookings on the first week of January. Out of which, 50 per cent are cancelled as of now. 45-50 percent of our business was affected," Sourabh Tiwari, owner of Sushant Travels told ANI.
"After October, our business was getting packed. We were getting a lot of bookings. We were completely packed since October last year till first week of January. After October, we had 15 groups of international arrivals. We could entertain only four international tours. All other groups were cancelled due to rising cases of COVID-19," he added.
"We are currently providing all the services with full protocols. We fully vaccinated drivers and sanitized vehicles. We are trying to make the tourist travel to places where there are very low COVID-19 cases,"he stated.
"Advanced bookings are 50 per cent are cancelled. People are extremely scared of the new wave," he added.
"There is a lot of fear. People took the second wave lightly which led to deaths and a lot of misery. Hence people are in fear. 50 to 60 pc occupancy in our hotels stands cancelled as of now. The people who have a necessity to travel only those people are travelling right now," said Vijay Tiwari,member of Delhi Hotel Mahasangh Association.
On mandatory seven day quarantine for international arrivals, he said, "its is not a challenge for us but it is a challenge for new people. We have experience. People who were coming before were Indians and NRIs".
"Now the foreigners are coming more in number, so its a new challenge. We have made all preparations from sanitization to masking etc for the seven day quarantine. We order online food from outside and provide meals to them".
On the loss suffered due to previous waves, he said, "We are not able to come out of the two shocks that we got in the first two waves, we used to get Rs 30,000-40,000 bills even from the closed properties. We have to give salaries to the staff as well. We incurred huge losses," he added.
Amid a surge in the COVID-19 cases, the Central government on Friday announced a seven-day mandatory home quarantine for all international arrivals in the country. (ANI)