WVa casino lays off staff amid pandemic

The Penn National Gaming-owned casino in West Virginia has permanently laid off several hundred furloughed staff.

US.- Penn National Gaming’s WVa casino in West Virginia has laid off 540 furloughed workers due to the strain of the coronavirus pandemic on the industry.

The company had furloughed around 26,000 workers at the height of the pandemic in April. It has since announced 1,150 lay offs across four Louisiana casinos.

A former member of staff, Wayne Thomas, has claimed that those who have been laid-off are not to receive any compensation for the time they spent furloughed.

Speaking to press, Thomas said: “We can understand all the layoffs. We get it. But we earned that PTO. They told us there was a policy change, but we hadn’t heard anything about it before we found out on the Facebook post.”

But Eric Schippers, senior VP for public affairs at Penn National Gaming, said “We let our furloughed team members know that we’ll be extending their Medical and Pharmacy benefits coverage once again through Aug 31.

“In addition, our COVID-19 Emergency Relief Fund, in which we’ve raised $1.7 million through private donations from our senior executives, board of directors, and our foundation, is also available to help our team members with any emergency funding needs. To date, more than $700,000 has already been approved and processed for distribution to our team members in need.”