PETALING JAYA: Restaurants are offering smaller menus and reducing their number of staff to stay afloat as their daily takings are low.
Indian Restaurant Owners Association (Primas) president T. Muthusamy said they are not drawing enough diners although their opening hours have been extended.
“We used to have customers who patron our restaurants after entertainment outlets had closed,” he said yesterday.
“We have lost this customer base. Social distancing in restaurants has an impact on our business too. We used to have 100 chairs but now we can only place about 40 chairs in the restaurant.”
Restaurants do not need so many waiters since patronage is low, Muthusamy said.
“Some owners rotate their employees based either on number of working hours or days,” he said.
He pointed out that the workers are still being paid despite working fewer hours.
Muthusamy said despite an increase in operating cost, restaurant owners dare not raise their prices as they canot afford to lose their regular customers.
Malaysian Muslim Restaurant Owners Association (Presma) president Datuk Jawahar Ali said the standard operating procedures (SOP) for restaurants have an impact on their business.
He said restaurants have to keep their prices low although the operating cost has gone up.
“Based on feedback from our members we expect at least 10% of restaurants to close if they do not get the necessary help from the government,” he said.
“Our members do not have a good working relationship with banks, the government needs to step in to help us overcome this problem.”
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