Convenience store material photo. Reporter Jeon Young-sun
On the 30th, the Korea Convenience Store Owners’ Association, a convenience store owners group, requested supplementation and review, and protested against the government’s 3rd Disaster Subsidy Payment Standard announced the day before.
The government has decided that small business owners who are eligible for the third disaster subsidy will be’less than 400 million won in annual sales, whose sales have decreased from last year’. Accordingly, the council objected that 45% of the convenience store sales did not take into account the fact that it was generated from low-margin cigarettes.
According to the council, the average sales of all convenience stores as of last year was 590 million won. Excluding cigarette sales, 80% of which is tax, average sales are around 325 million won. Excluding cigarette sales, it is argued that it meets the government’s criteria for providing disaster assistance.
In addition, the council argued that it is unreasonable to be excluded from support on a uniform basis in situations where the damage is serious, such as a deficit of hundreds of millions of won due to a sharp drop in sales at convenience stores in special areas such as inside and outside schools, entertainment districts, office districts, tourist destinations, and sports facilities. did.
In addition, in the metropolitan area, Busan, Chungnam, and Jeju, all convenience stores are subject to group restrictions where eating and drinking is prohibited from 9:00 pm to 5:00 am the next day, regardless of whether or not they are registered as a rest food business. However, under this measure, only convenience stores that have registered the rest food business can receive a 2 million won subsidy for the group restricted business.
Regardless of this, Choi Jong-yeol, chairman of CU member store owners’ council, said, “The government sets the criteria for the provision of disaster subsidies and does not take into account the actual situation or the situation at the site.” As I actively participated in the countermeasures, I hope to apply reasonable standards.”
Reporter Oh Wonseok [email protected]