Lay My Hat

I'm struggling to find anything helpful online and I'm wondering if anyone here can offer clarity. If the county where our property is located is introduced into the Tier 3 (Very High) restrictions where travel and overnight stays are restricted and we have to cancel our bookings, will we get financial support?

We are located in Northumberland and this is our only source of income so our anxiety is running high. The north east is in Tier 2 at the moment with talks of it going even higher. With the introduction of these new Tiers, we've had to refund guests who live in Tier 3 locations and now cannot travel to our property.

From what I can tell, hospitality businesses forced to close will get up to £3000 every few weeks depending on their rateable value. But do self catering properties count for this support?

Thanks in advance

Are you certain that holiday cottages in Tier 3 (Very High) have to close for business?
According to the advice from Holidaycottages.co.uk, the UK government has not made it illegal to travel to a holiday cottage in a “very high” (tier 3) lockdown location (unless you are travelling as more than one household) they have asked people not to travel into the area.
If this is correct, I assume because the business has not been instructed to close down you would not be entitled to compensation.
https://www.holidaycottages.co.uk/coron ... guest-faqs

Thank you for your reply!

That's as we feared. Everywhere we've looked has said we need to refund or move guest's bookings if they're outside of the Tier 3 area. We could still have guests come and stay from inside the county but we hardly ever have guests that local to us. So whilst we're not technically closed we have no income.

Evchaaa wrote:Thank you for your reply!

That's as we feared. Everywhere we've looked has said we need to refund or move guest's bookings if they're outside of the Tier 3 area. We could still have guests come and stay from inside the county but we hardly ever have guests that local to us. So whilst we're not technically closed we have no income.

From my understanding you can stay open for business regardless of what tier you are in. The only restriction is that guests who are in Tier 3 (Very High) are not allowed to travel and stay outside of their area, which currently only includes Lancashire and Liverpool.
Though of course, circumstances may change, people from the rest of the country can still holiday in your cottage without undue restrictions.
Lest us hope these bleak times will soon pass and we can return back to some semblance of normal living
P.S. I have had a look at your website and your cottage looks first rate.

Thank you, that's very kind.

Northumberland seems to have a week reprieve to prove infections are decreasing otherwise we will be put into Tier 3 and in that case all our bookings for the next few weeks from outside the area will, fingers crossed, be moved to next year.

We're really hoping 2021 will be a better year for everyone, including finding an effective way to get this virus in check.

I would hope that given its the towns and cities that are pushing numbers up in Northumberland that if it went into tier 3 it would specify those places only (ie not the rural touristy areas). So depending on where you are you may be ok.

Currently the best place to keep up to date with all of this, including the lack of financial support, is the PASC website and more importantly their FB page for frequent updates.