A possible rise in the VAT rate for hotel services fires up strong reactions by the Greek tourism industry. Such a move would be “suicidal” claims Andreas Andreadis, head of the Association of Greek Tourism Enterprises (SETE), while Hellenic Chamber of Hotels (HCH) President Giorgos Tsakiris, in a letter to Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, asks for PM’s personal intervention in order to prevent the increase. “At a time when tourism is taking off, the government is proposing to double the VAT rate”, said Andreadis in reference to recent reports regarding the government’s proposal to double the tourism VAT in order to bridge the gap in the Troika negotiations, underlining further that it was the exceptional rise recorded in tourism that helped the Greek economy return to growth.
On his behalf, Tsakiris said that a possible increase in the VAT rate poses a threat to the industry’s viability, since tourist contracts have already been signed for the season ahead, while its effects on the tourism product will be devastating for years to come. “Instead of taking strategic measures for the institutional strengthening of tourism aiming to ensure its sustainable development, short-sighted and wrong measures are being activated, based on an anti-development and purely revenue collection rationale, which condemn the Greek tourism to return to the old gloomy days”.