TEHRAN—Some 13 hotels in Tehran accommodated 1,100 people affected by Israeli attacks, said the hoteliers in a gathering with Tourism Minister Reza Salehi-Amiri in Tehran.

Shahram Shirvani, a member of the Iranian Hoteliers Association, also said that hoteliers have been at work and involved as soldiers for the country. Some Tehrani citizens left the city, but hotel staff were besides the government, he added, Mehr news agency reported.

Jamshid Hamzehzadeh, head of the Iranian Hoteliers Association, said when war started, all hotels of the country paid all cancellations without any penalties.
“This means we didn't have any passengers who cancel the hotel booking and get fined.”

Also, Soltani, head of the Mazandaran Interstate Catering Units Association, said Mazandaran province hosted the war-affected Tehrani people. “We provided them with the best conditions we could. We hope to get out of this crisis.” 

Fariba Abbasi, managing director of one of the hotel groups, said: “We have 51 units active across the country. We have 3,900 beds. We formed crisis document in central office. Our staff were at work. We divided the regions in provinces of Mazandaran, Golestan, and Semnan. We witnessed drop in number of tourists in Kerman, Yazd, and Shiraz. We had the highest number of occupancy rate in Alborz hotels, but the hotels have not become empty yet. We paid four billion rials ($4,706) to travelers for hotel cancellation.”

Kamyar Eskandarion, secretary of Iranian Hoteliers Association, said, “Please check the reservation systems. In some cases, people have reserved the hotel and then cancelled it. But since they have reserved via online sites, the sites do not return the money.”

Mohammadpour, a travel agency consultant, said, “Call on the tax collectors to be fair.”

Meanwhile, Ebrahim Pourfaraj, a tour leader, said the conditions are not satisfactory for travel agencies and hoteliers. “I am constructor of Iran’s biggest hotel. We have decided to lower the construction trend. We are not in rush to construct the hotel.”

KD