InfraCore expects to make less than half of forecast profit

Council controlled organisation InfraCore is expecting to make less than half of its expected profit for the year, it has revealed.

Staff layoffs may also be on the cards, depending on whether work picks up.

In a report presented to the Rotorua Lakes Council's operations and monitoring committee today, InfraCore said it was expecting to make a profit of $120,000 at the end of the financial year.

It had initially expected to make $250,000.

"During the second quarter the business has fallen further behind budget with the company losing a further $73k during Q2 [quarter two] to bring the YTD position to a $271k loss. It had been budgeted to make a profit of $64k for Q2 after a loss in Q1," the report states.

"The two primary reasons for this shortfall are the lower than budgeted project work levels in the quarter and a larger than budgeted level of expenditure on materials and consumables."

InfraCore chief executive Tim Hammond said the company had "some success" in picking up work, but not as much as it had planned.

There had been no staff made redundant as of yet, as there had been enough vacancies to move staff into other roles as required, he said.

It was "still possible we might end up with a shortfall of work, but I can't see that in the immediate future".

Hammond said the company was finding about one in every four tenders it put forward was successful. It was hoped that would be increased to one in every three tenders, he said.

There was a further $2.6 million of work the company was "actively chasing", the report states.

That would likely be for the next financial year.