Rental exemption into March

The Finance Ministry intends to extend the suspension on rental payments for companies forced to remain closed into March. This will mostly concern enterprises in food service and tourism.

If retail commerce continues to operate and is not forced by the health data to close again, the government’s interventions will be exclusively targeted at food service and tourism, and any enterprises currently not able to operate. For its part, the state will compensate individual landlords to the tune of 80% of the original rent, and companies that rent out stores to enterprises with 60% of the rent.

That means the rental payment exemptions will go on to cover the first quarter of the year, and if food service and tourism businesses remain shuttered the measure will be extended into April too. The same will also apply to the suspension of labor contracts, not ruling out any additional subsidies so as to avoid more enterprise closures this year.

Landlords face significant problems not only due to the delays by the state in crediting the compensation to their accounts, but also because of the unclear policy regarding the 40% rent reduction for companies that are operating in January.