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Letters | Rent deferment is last hope for Hong Kong’s battered small businesses
- Readers ask for help for struggling SMEs and the Star Ferry, suggest how ‘Covid-19 survivors’ can provide a lifeline for restaurants and bars, disagree with closed clubs charging full fees, and hope for more creative leadership
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The compulsory closure of fitness centres has been in effect for 70 days and is expected to last at least 104 days in all. Since the pandemic began, there have been a total of over five months of forced closures in previous waves, and the longest stretch we have been allowed to do business in the last two years is about 10 months.
How is a small business expected to survive?
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Online classes are out of the question. We mainly teach pole dancing and aerial arts, and the number of students that have the proper set-up to do this at home is negligible.
We have had no choice to put all our staff on non-paid leave. We have no idea if they will return as some have had to find other jobs or have left the city.
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Rent alone accounts for half of our normal expenditure. That is the cost of doing business in Hong Kong, and one we have managed to make work during normal times. How we are supposed to make it work under the current restrictions is anyone’s guess.
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