Hairdressers demand a 10% VAT reduction to facilitate their return to activity
MADRID
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The Alliance of Hairdressing Entrepreneurs of Spain has requested the Government the drop from 21 to 10% of VAT in the sector coinciding with the opening this Monday of beauty salons by appointment and guaranteeing the permanence inside the establishment of a client for each worker.
The Official State Gazette (BOE) published this Sunday the conditions that will govern the reopening of certain economic activities in the so-called Phase 0 of the Plan for the new normalization of the Government, including hairdressers, which have been closed since last March 14 when the coronavirus alarm state was decreed.
The hairdressers, from this Monday, They must guarantee individualized customer service with due physical separation or through the installation of counters or partitions. and establishing an appointment system that guarantees the permanence inside the establishment or premises of a single client for each worker, without waiting areas being enabled.
They will also establish a preferential service schedule for people over 65s, which must be made to coincide with the time slots for walks and physical activity of this group.
"The extreme weakness of the hairdressing sector after eight years of a disproportionate VAT at 21% makes it urgent to recover the reduced VAT to save the sector," said the hairdressing alliance, which considers that the drop to 10% could inject 451 million euros to a sector that calculates that during 2020 it will have losses of 1,280 million euros.
Previous appointment and limited capacity
The opening from this Monday of the hairdressing salons by appointment and with a limited capacity of 30%, "without the necessary legal, labor and sanitary measures leads to the collapse of tens of thousands of hairdressing salons", according to the Businessmen's Alliance Hairdressing.
The alliance, which refers to a survey carried out in more than 3,500 hairdressing salons in Spain, highlights that «the launch of its activity with all the restrictive measures, threatens the ruin in cascade of 42.4% of the micro-SMEs in the sector of hairdressing salons and the loss of more than 16,000 jobs ».
The opening of the establishments without the approval of flexible ERTEs and without solving the problem of rents, or the injection of liquidity by banks and ICO credits"It represents a threat that can cause the ruin of the sector," as they have pointed out.
94% of the hairdressing sector are micro-companies with less than five workers, generating more than 250,000 direct and indirect jobs, according to the alliance that refers to sources from the National Association of Perfumery and Cosmetics Stanpa.
Half has opened
In a statement, the president of ATA, Lorenzo Amor, has indicated that the impact of the de-escalation has been scarce in sectors such as commerce and hospitality, while in hairdressing salons "50% can be said to have opened today".
"We hope that throughout the week this figure will rise to at least 70%," Amor said after putting the opening of retail trade at 20%, which could reach 40% at the end of the week, once they have been completed. I have been adapting the safety and hygiene protocols.
