More empty hotel rooms

By Edward Marr

SCOTLAND'S hotel sector had the biggest fall in occupancy and lowest increase in rooms yield in April compared with the rest of the UK, according to the latest monthly survey by accountants and business advisers PKF.

Edinburgh had the biggest falls in occupancy and rooms yield, down 5.2 and 2.2 respectively. Aberdeen’s hotels saw occupancy fall 0.5, but rooms yield achieve a healthy increase of 15.8. Only Glasgow experienced an increase in both occupancy and rooms yield.

Alastair Rae, a partner at PKF, said: “The relatively small reduction in occupancy may, in part, be due to the early Easter this year and an unequal comparison with last year‘s figures. However this does not explain why Scottish hotels have bucked the UK trend and shown a fall in occupancy and a relatively modest increase in rooms yield."