Spain hit by staff shortage, British holiday travellers set to be affected

British citizens planning to spend their summer holidays in the Spanish town of Benidorm may be in for a bad experience due to a staff shortage there.

Benidorm is a seaside town on the eastern coast of Spain. It is a popular Mediterranean holiday destination famous for its nightlife. However, a shortage of waiters this season has already forced some bars and pubs to close earlier than usual.

The tourists could face longer waiting hours to get served at various bars and restaurants often frequented by visitors from the UK. Before Brexit, hundreds of British youngsters used to rush to the popular tourist destination for jobs and vacations, but that number has come down significantly.

Industry experts claim that there are currently around 4,000 vacancies in Benidorm, but employers are unable to fill these vacancies due to a combination of factors such as low pay, poor working conditions and long working hours.

Mar Valera, spokesperson for the Provincial Association of Hospitality Entrepreneurs of Alicante, has said that reducing the working hours is one of the solutions to deal with a possible crisis.

Some of the experts fear that 50 percent of the roles will not be filled before the peak summer season, which essentially implies that tourists will not have many options to explore if they do jet off to Spain for holidays.

However, some people believe that money is not the problem since people working as waiters do have the option of earning good money through tips and wages.

"The salary of a waiter in Benidorm is about €1,200 per month and in addition, there are a lot of tips, especially with the English – each waiter takes about €300 more per month," Alex Fratini, a spokesperson for the Association of Bars, Restaurants and Cafeterias of Benidorm, told The Sun.

It is not just Benidorm that is facing a worker's shortage, in April there were more than 17,000 unfilled hospitality positions across Spain.

The reports of staff shortages in Spain come in the backdrop of British holidaymakers being warned about "illegal parties" in tourist hotspots such as Mallorca or Ibiza. The authorities have asked British citizens to stay away from such parties if they are planning to spend their holidays in Spain.