Additional Omicron business support - tourism recovery

Visit Scotland are opening a new fund to support businesses which were impacted by the Omicron variant but not eligible for previous funding rounds in 2021. 

The Fund has been designed to support businesses which were not eligible to receive any previous COVID-19 recovery funding through the six original funds. It will be open to businesses operating in the respective sectors:

• Coach operators 
• Day tour operators
• Hostels
• Inbound tour operators
• Marine / outdoor
• Visitor attraction

These are the sectors which, following discussion with STERG (Scottish Tourism Emergency Response Group), sector leads and the Scottish Government, were agreed to have been the most severely impacted by Omicron.  

Businesses in these sectors may be able to apply for the new payments, worth up to £6,800 each, if they did not receive previous funding in 2021 because they:  

• Were not established or trading until after 2019/2020;   
• Were unable to provide the financial evidence required, for example, due to being a new business and unable to provide published accounts for the required time period;  
• Had a change in ownership;  

• Were temporarily closed due to renovations, improvements, development. 

Businesses will have to show that they were open between 8 December 2021 and 21 January 2022 and were impacted directly as a result of the COVID-19 Omicron restrictions during this period. 

Applications will be open from 12pm Wednesday 23 March 2022 to 5pm on Wednesday 30 March 2022. Any applications received after this period will not be considered. Applications will not be assessed on a first come, first served basis.  For more details about the application process see the Visit Scotland website.