Asian guest workers appear among waiters: Hungary’s hospitality sector struggles to fill jobs

Hungary’s hospitality industry is once again grappling with labour shortages as the spring and summer tourism season approaches, prompting employers to look for guest workers. While hotels and restaurants can still find chefs and trained waiters in many cases, employers say it is increasingly difficult to recruit workers for less popular roles such as dishwashers, cleaners and housekeeping staff.

As a result, more venues are turning to foreign guest workers to fill these gaps, with Asian guest workers now appearing not only in back-of-house roles but also among waitstaff.

Industry insiders say the issue is especially visible outside Budapest, where a smaller labour pool and limited training opportunities make recruitment even harder.

Rural areas face the biggest challenges

Rudolf Semsei, vice president of the Hungarian Hospitality Industry Association, told Portfolio that the labour situation differs significantly between Budapest and the countryside.

While the capital offers larger venues and more career opportunities, many rural restaurants and hotels struggle to attract trained professionals. A major reason is that hospitality graduates often move to Budapest for work, leaving smaller towns with fewer qualified candidates.

Semsei believes stronger cooperation with vocational schools could help solve part of the problem. If hospitality businesses establish relationships with students during their training, they may be able to build a more stable workforce over time.

However, smaller establishments outside the capital often lack the resources to provide mentors for trainees, which makes long-term staff development more difficult.

Asian guest workers increasingly visible

Labour shortages remain most acute in manual hospitality roles such as cleaners, housekeepers and dishwashers. According to Roland Sívó, adviser to the National Association of Tourism Hospitality Employers, many restaurants struggle to find applicants even for basic kitchen jobs.

To address this, some establishments are hiring guest workers from abroad.

“In some restaurants, it is no longer unusual to see waiters from the Philippines or Sri Lanka,” Sívó said.

Foreign staff can also be found in higher-end hotels, where Ukrainian or Mongolian employees sometimes fill operational roles. However, communication can occasionally present challenges, particularly when both foreign and Hungarian workers have limited English proficiency.