Hospitality bosses including Whitbread hike pay to claw back staff

Hospitality bosses hike pay to claw back staff: Chefs offered £50k salaries and workers at Beefeater, Brewers Fayre and Premier Inn get a rise from £10.60 as job vacancies soar by 83%

  • Whitbread warned costs will rise by up to £30m due to pay and other expenses
  • There are now 170,000 vacancies across hospitality sector, according to ONS
  • UK Hospitality CEO Kate Nicholls said this was ‘impeding’ ability of firms to trade

Beefeater, Brewers Fayre and Premier Inn owner Whitbread has hiked staff wages as an 83 per cent rise in job vacancies prompts an industry-wide rush to claw back staff – with pub chefs offered as much as £50,000 a year. 

Whitbread warned its annual costs will rise by up to £30million due to the pay increases, which are expected to apply across the board. Currently, workers in the firm’s kitchens are paid between £9.98 and £10.60 an hour. 

There are now 170,000 vacancies across the hospitality sector, according to the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS). UK Hospitality CEO Kate Nicholls said this was ‘impeding’ the ability of pubs, cafes and restaurants to trade. 

In April 2022, weekly earnings were 15.1 per cent higher than a year earlier – against a 9 per cent rate of inflation. This is the highest wage growth of any sector, and means hospitality is one of the few parts of the economy seeing real wage increases. 

Whitbread today cautioned its annual costs will rise by up to £30million due to the pay increases

In April, Wetherspoons revealed a 20p pay boost for workers, which took them above £10 for the first time. The National Living Wage is currently £9.50.    

Chefs’ wages across the industry are up by 7 per cent this year to £9.58 an hour. 

Prospective head chefs in pubs have been offered salaries of as much as £50,000, the Morning Advertiser reported after analysing job adverts. 

Whitbread said UK demand was ahead of its expectations, with first-quarter accommodation sales 31 per cent ahead of the pre-pandemic levels two years ago, and 235.6 per cent ahead of a year earlier when restrictions affected trading. 

But it said labour supply ‘remains tight’, meaning higher wages were needed to tempt new staff and persuade existing employees to stay.  

‘Assuming that consumer demand and occupancy remain strong, we expect some additional costs due to targeted pay increases,’ a spokesman said. 

‘We are also taking the opportunity to bring forward our investment in refurbishments and maintenance projects as well as accelerate some additional IT spend that will underpin our market-leading position and drive future earnings.’

The Premier Inn owner said labour supply 'remains tight', meaning higher wages were needed to tempt new staff and persuade existing employees to stay

The Premier Inn owner said labour supply ‘remains tight’, meaning higher wages were needed to tempt new staff and persuade existing employees to stay

Official figures released yesterday showed that vacancies in the hospitality sector jumped to a record high of 174,000 last month as businesses face the possibility of staff shortages over the key summer season.

British hospitality businesses recorded 83 per cent more vacancies over the three months to May than over the same period in 2019, before the pandemic struck.

Almost four in five hospitality venues had raised wages to attract more staff, UK Hospitality revealed in March.