The goal of the government is not to help the industry, but to ensure the income of the state budget. Association of Hotels of Armenia

by times news cr

2024-10-07 01:21:52

On April 20, the non-governmental organization “Hotel Association of Armenia” once again appealed to the RA government regarding the problems faced by the companies operating in the field of tourism, and especially hotel economies, and their possible solutions.

“Hotel Association of Armenia” NGO was established in 2019 with the main goal and mission of supporting the member hotels in protecting their common interests, raising the most important issues of the sector, informing them about the process of their solution and development trends. Currently, we are crippled by 18 hotels operating in the territory of RA with more than 1,800 rooms.

“We ask all tourism companies, groups of companies, associations, unions and employees of all affected companies to join our call and raise this important issue in unison. Our proposed solution will allow the tourism sector of Armenia not only to face this devastating crisis, but also to come out of this situation with honor.

S. On March 16, we sent an open letter to the Government of the Republic of Armenia, in which we urged them to urgently respond to the problems faced by companies operating in the tourism sector, and especially hotel economies, and to take immediate steps to avoid putting the sector in crisis in an even more difficult situation.

The most important and, in our opinion, the most effective of our proposals would be to postpone the tax obligations of the economic entities of the hotel sector. A step that the governments of many states had already implemented by that time and which gave the expected result.

After March 16, two tax payment deadlines have already passed (March 20 and April 20), putting travel companies in an even more difficult situation than before, and during this period, unfortunately, not only did we not have a solution to this problem, we did not even receive an official rejection from the Government of the Republic of Armenia, with an explanation as to why that step was rejected, and no alternative solution to the problem was offered.

The Government of RA formulates the aid provided by it as a targeted aid to the given sector, but in fact this aid serves to pay off tax obligations to the state. In other words, the goal is not to help the sector, but to provide income to the state budget, which reduces the effectiveness of the given measures, if not nullifies them altogether.

In our opinion, during the most devastating crisis for tourism in the history of the world, the state aid should be directed to the implementation of tourism companies, including the salaries of hotel employees, mandatory interest payments on loan obligations, utilities and other vital costs for companies.

Considering that paying tax debts is a higher priority for some companies, during this period they had to reduce the salary fund given to their employees, be it by sending employees to forced idle time, not inviting foreign employees back to work, reducing the positions that are not necessary for the daily operation of the company at the moment. literally to service the empty hotels, or in general by suspending the company’s activities for an indefinite period, making all the employees unemployed.

The Armenian Hotels Association urges the RA Government and local self-government bodies.

– all tax obligations and mandatory fees of tourist companies that arose in 2020. From March 1 to 2021 between April 30,
– 2020 accept the payments made for the months of March and April as an advance payment.
– 2021 From May 1, launch a new post-crisis taxation system specifically for the tourism sector, reducing the burden of high taxation and thus ensuring the recovery of the tourism sector, which has been created thanks to so many years of hard work, and encouraging new investments in the sector and a return to double-digit growth in the following years.

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