Japanese thermal hotel owners in hot water
Japan’s tourism industry has reportedly been rocked by allegations that many of its famous “onsen”, or hot-spring hotels, have been cheating their customers by using heated tap water.
A report in today’s edition of The Times states that dozens of the country’s 3,000 such hotels have admitted dishonesty. According to the newspaper, one famous hotel was caught adding coloured salts to its water, others have been using ordinary hot water from a tap, and one (unnamed) resort was caught using “waste water from a geothermal power plant”.
Japanese residents reportedly make some 140 million visits to such resorts each year. Yoshihisa Suzuki, head of the union of Minakami hot spring keepers, is quoted as saying: “The truth is that we knew this kind of thing went on. The best thing we can now do to win back trust is to be as open and honest as we can be.”
Report by Tim Gillett, News From Abroad Ltd
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