Boots asked to compensate businesses impacted by roof repairs

The council has asked Boots to compensate neighbouring businesses who lost vital trade while its city centre store’s roof was repaired.

North Street was temporarily closed last month after damage to Boots caused by Storm Kathleen meant urgent work was needed to secure parts of the store’s roof.

A safety cordon was set up to protect residents from falling debris and to allow Boots to arrange for its contractors to complete the work. This led to some neighbouring shops within the safety cordon closing for four days to protect staff and customers, while others were heavily impacted by reduced footfall.

The council has now written to Boots to express its concern at the impact the work had on those businesses and the wider disruption the road closure caused to residents and visitors

The letter highlights the damaging impact four days of closure will have had on the finances of those neighbouring businesses and to ask Boots to explore ways to provide suitable levels of compensation to those affected.

It also raises concerns that this work could have potentially been avoided given the same section of roof was also damaged by winds in November of last year.

Councillor Jacob Taylor, deputy leader and cabinet member for Finance and City Regeneration, said: “The safety of our residents and visitors will always be our priority and so it was absolutely right to close this section of North Street while repair work was taking place.

“This did, however, have a significant impact on nearby businesses – including some who were closed for four days during the busy Easter school holidays.

“We think it’s only fair that Boots talk to those businesses most affected by this work to discuss ways to compensate them for the loss of trade.

“Our understanding is Boots is planning major investment in its store over the summer which we welcome. Hopefully this work will help avoid similar emergency work being needed in the future.”