A Welsh travel agency owner has resorted to cashing in her pension to pay her staff with the ending of furlough.
Ann Jones, who owns Menai Travel, in Caernarfon, Gwynedd, said: “I don’t want to lose my staff, they are like family and help run the business.”
She told BBC Radio Wales she was “not happy” the scheme was ending and has been protesting to try and get the scheme extended throughout the winter.
Jones, who has run the agency for 15 years, revealed she had barely made any revenue in the last two years.
“It’s not an easy life being in the travel industry,” she said.
If the government continued to ease travel restrictions “things will get moving again”.
She added: “It’s going to take all winter for me to start seeing some proper revenue coming into the business.
“The government said they’ve given specific support for every industry – they’ve given it to the airlines, but not small high-street travel businesses.
“It is heart-breaking for me to build up my business over the years… I just feel I’m just a number to them and not a person.”
The furlough scheme ended on Thursday after being introduced in March 2020 at the start of the pandemic.
It helped pay the wages of 11.6 million workers after large parts of the economy were shut down due to the pandemic.