Nearly 1,000 former Encanto Restaurants employees have registered on Puerto Rico’s unemployment portal after the company closed about 180 KFC, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut and IHOP locations across the island, Labor Secretary María del Pilar Vélez Casanova said. The closures affected between 2,600 and 2,700 workers. Laid-off employees attended a recruitment and support services fair on Tuesday at the Palacio de Recreación y Deportes in Mayagüez, where they were helped to apply for unemployment and met dozens of employers and work agencies offering jobs in restaurants, hospitals, construction and real estate.
Efraín Martes Méndez, who worked at Pizza Hut for 35 years and 10 months, said the brand had declined before but that nothing like this had happened. José Miguel Oliveras, who worked at the Taco Bell in Mayagüez since 1998, called it a hard blow. Ninotshka Almodóvar Bonilla, a laid-off KFC employee, said products were missing and the air conditioning was broken in the weeks before the closures, which some workers learned of on social media and others during their shifts.
Workers said many are still waiting for their final paycheck and vacation pay, and that Encanto Restaurants, which filed for bankruptcy, has not answered its phones. Vélez Casanova said the government is considering suing the company because it was required to give 60 days’ notice of the layoffs. Upcoming fairs are planned for San Juan, Ponce and Fajardo.