BOULEVARD Holdings, Inc. (BHI) is undertaking measures to help its employees affected by the closure of Boracay island, which is scheduled on Thursday.
In a disclosure to the stock exchange, BHI, the parent of the owner and operator of Friday’s Boracay Island Beach Resort, said it will be allocating P350,000 a month for the payment of P7,000 each to 50 regular employees.
It has also laid off 30 seasonal employees and on-the-job training staffers in time for the Boracay closure.
Five to six of the regular staff will remain in the island, along with security guards to run minimal water, power, and housekeeping for the Friday’s resort.
The company will also be transferring between 10 to 13 staff to Friday’s Puerto Galera Beach Resort in Boquete Island in Oriental Mindoro. Four senior managers in operations, finance, and marketing will also be transferred to BHI’s Puerto Galera operations, and will receive reduced pay during their stint in the resort.
Including the payment for the employees to be transferred to the Puerto Galera resort, BHI is set to spend P1.3 million every month while Boracay island is closed. The company said it has secured a monthly loan from one of its major shareholders to fund this cost.
Friday’s has yet to fund the P35 million it needs to renovate 50 boutique hotel rooms in Boracay.
Meanwhile, BHI will also incur P700,000 in interest payments every month until July.
BHI had earlier said that the Boracay closure will lead to a P35 million in losses due to fixed costs and expenses for the upkeep of the resort for six months. The company further stands to lose P6.5 million of monthly revenues from April to October.
Even before the island’s closure, the company had already lost P22 million in advanced deposit cancellations from other countries such as China and Germany.
While BHI also has operations in Puerto Galera, it said the new resort may not be enough to offset the losses from Boracay’s closure.
“Its sales driver and sales growth driver for the year 2018 will be heavily affected barring any pickup from its new outlet in Puerto Galera,” BHI said.
BHI booked an attributable loss of P1.77 million in the nine months ending February, against the net income attributable to the parent of P2.02 million in generated in the same period a year before. This came amid an 11% increase in revenues to P79.37 million for the period.
Shares in BHI lost 0.10 centavos or 1.79% to close at 5.5 centavos at the stock exchange on Wednesday. — Arra B. Francia
