The hospitality industry is facing an unprecedented challenge, and difficult times lay ahead for hard-working people in our sector. At VenueScanner, we are committed to supporting our partner venues and continuing to do the thing we are best at: matching event organisers with brilliant spaces all over the UK.
Our priorities for managing the COVID-19 threat are:
- To help our venue hosts with guidance on policy to avoid them suffering too much of a hit to revenue, and to support them through this difficult period by offering financial and flexible benefits.
FAQs – For Venues:
Q) Is Coronavirus affecting enquiries? Has there been a dip across the board?
A) We have seen a drop in enquiries for immediate term events like meetings and birthday parties coming up. However, we have seen an increase in enquiries for summer parties, team away days, offsites, Christmas parties and conferences later in the year. We are confident people will continue to book events for later in the year but anticipate an increase in cancellations for April events and a drop in immediate event booking.
Q) Should venues be refunding or keeping deposits for postponed events?
A) We recommend that venues impose a postponement policy allowing event organisers to move their booking to a date later in the year (up to a six month period). Doing so would do wonders to ensure customers stay loyal and should help to recoup lost revenue caused by the peak of the virus.
Q) What can we try for bookings that are under immediate threat of cancellation?
A) Venues can consider bringing in a voucher scheme, whereby if someone needs to cancel a smaller-scale event in the next couple of weeks, you could ask the customer if they would instead like to buy a voucher for food / drinks which they can redeem later in the year. Vouchers would ease the threat to your cashflow and give the customer something to look forward to once the isolation policies are relaxed.
