June 03, Colombo: Sri Lanka Tourist Hotel Owners' Association says that they are now in trouble even to pay the salaries of the hotel staff and some small and medium scale hotel owners have had to depend on the high interest bank overdrafts for that.

The occupancy rate of many outstation hotels have fallen to five to ten percents while the Colombo star class occupancy has also fallen to 35% as the tourist arrivals in the first four months of this year declined 33% compared to the last year.

Meanwhile the hotel staff lament over the decline of their service charge incomes due to the lack of tourists.

Around 125,000 are engaged in the tourist hotel industry which comprises of 145 hotels and 13,500 rooms.