Hospitality businesses are losing £55m a year on inefficient staff training, according to research from compliance training provider Skillcast.
The Lost Hours Report analysed national employment data across 11 sectors to assess how much training fails to improve job performance or close skill gaps. Hospitality businesses lost 2.8m hours annually, ranking among the worst-performing sectors.
The sector’s fast-paced nature often means more time is spent on basic and mandatory training. Wholesale and retail lost 2.6m hours (£51.4m), while business services ranked highest overall at 3.3m hours.
The report found that as time spent on mandatory training increases, the proportion of employees not considered fully proficient in their roles also rises, suggesting volume alone is not closing skills gaps.
Nationally, over 21m training hours each year are not delivering the intended skills outcomes, equivalent to 2.82m working days or the annual capacity of more than 11,000 full-time employees. Across all industries, this represents nearly £415m in annual training costs that are not delivering a clear return on investment.
UK businesses invest more than £50bn a year in training and development, yet the nation continues to lag behind the US, G7 and EU on productivity.
“Hospitality businesses are under constant pressure to onboard staff quickly and maintain standards, but that often comes at the expense of more valuable skills development,” said Vivek Dodd, chief executive of Skillcast. “It’s not just the time and money spent on training itself but the missed opportunities to develop employees’ skills in a way that delivers value.”
The research also measured the skills gap density across 11 sectors. The national skills density gap stands at 4%, meaning one in 25 UK workers lack the skills to do their job as effectively as possible. Hospitality has the biggest deficit at 6.2%, followed by the public sector at 6%.