Italy’s Instituto per il Credito Sportivo has launched a spontaneous initiative in order to help those who cannot afford the mortgage resulting from the COVID-19 crisis. Credito Sportivo is an Italian public bank administrated by Italy’s national bank, Banca d’Italia.
Business owners impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic can request the suspension of mortgage installments due between the months of March and September 2020.
As SwimSwam Italia’s Giusy Cisale explains, when someone in Italy needs to borrow money in order to build or do maintenance work on a swimming pool or even pay employees, suppliers, and others, they are at financial risk because just a part of the costs is covered by the government.
This ties into swimming in that, as most of the nation’s swimming pools are closed since late February due to the confinement, they are facing difficulties in making their monthly payments to the government. In response, Italy’s Swimming Federation president Paolo Barelli has issued a statement asking the government for financial support. The statement reads as follows:
“The suspension will not entail additional costs for the customer.
It may concern both the entire facility, including the fixed cost and the interest, but this will only cover the fixed portion, owing the interest payment on the due date.
All customers whose debt exposures are not classified as impaired credit exposures (which will instead be assessed on a case-by-case basis) in accordance with the regulations applicable to credit intermediaries will be eligible for the coverage.”
“We are experiencing a crisis that I have never seen before. Many pool’s managers have written to me in the last few days saying that they won’t be able to open anymore,” Cisale said.
The smaller club teams are the most vulnerable, clarified Cisale.
Just recently in March, Italy approved a decree called “Cura Italia,” providing those who have lost their jobs due to the lockdown with a payment of € 500.00 (approximately $ 552 USD) per month. The decree includes swimming instructors.
The financial institution has also created a response team in order to take care of the situation.
Italy has been on national lockdown since March 9. According to the website worldometers.info, the nation stands second in terms of total cases associated with COVID-19 as they have reported a total of 101,739 cases and 11,591 deaths.