Citywest Hotel set to reopen as HSE check out of facility

CITYWEST Hotel is to reopen to the public today as the HSE checks out of its near two year contract with the company.

The 756-bed hotel, operated by Tetrarch Capital, was utilised as a self-isolation and quarantine centre for health care workers for most of the last two years.

In March 2020, the HSE agreed to pay Tetrarch €21m for use of the property for seven months, paying an extra €1.9m for use of the convention centre, which was prepared as a 300-bed field hospital.

Despite intentions to use the entire hotel as a Covid-19 isolation facility, occupancy rates never went above 21.5 per cent.

The field hospital was never used.

The HSE opened a test centre on the grounds in September 2020, and shortly afterwards negotiated a new deal at a lower rate for use of the hotel.

According to the HSE, more than 361,000 swabs were taken at Citywest in the 16 months up to mid-January.

It stopped testing people there on January 21, moving its testing centre to the old Marks and Spencers store beside The Square.

Vaccinations began at Citywest in January 2021 and were still being given at the hotel last week.

The HSE have said they are grateful to the management and staff of Citywest Hotel for accommodating the test centre for the past 16 months, and who “continue to work with the Covid vaccination service, which will remain in Citywest”.

Accounts filed last autumn by Alva Glen Investments, a company associated with Tetrarch, show that Citywest Hotel Group returned to profit in 2020 after it’s deal with the HSE and reduction of costs associated with operating a hotel.

It has a profit, before tax, of just under €245,000, compared with a loss before tax of €3.16m in 2019.

In it’s directors report, the company said it “continued to be loss-making since October 2020 when the HSE signed an extension to June 30, 2021, at a materially lower rate.”

Citywest Hotel is understood to have secured a number of overseas and conference bookings ahead of its reopening, including the Hardware Show, which is due to take place over two days in April.