Owners of a Canberra hospitality group say they are working through a restructure, after a local musician alleged consistent delayed payments for her work.
Singer and DJ Sophie Edwards said she sent more than 50 reminders to the owners of Blackbird bar in Civic about outstanding payments for her performances.
It took posting to social media for her money to finally come through, she said.
"I played three different gigs for them over February and it took around 60 days for me to be paid, and usually my terms are a week," Ms Edwards said.
"It took 52 reminders, a letter of demand and posting publicly about the company before they took notice."
Ms Edwards said her social media post attracted messages from dozens of other performers who had similar issues with late payments from Blackbird.
Blackbird co-owners Will Fisher and Marcellus Heleta acknowledged the delayed payments and said they were restructuring their hospitality businesses.
The directors also operate Gather Cafe, Wine Room and Dash Cafe in Braddon.
Mr Fisher said the businesses were operating as usual and the directors were working through any outstanding debts.
"Within the last year, we've gone through a bit of a restructure," he said.
"It's been a roller-coaster, to say the least.
"We're in the business working tons of hours to try and get everything as clean as possible and clean up any outstanding debts and make sure everyone gets paid."
Former cafe business in liquidation
As part of the restructure, two companies related to the hospitality group were recently placed into liquidation.
Hellfish Hospitality Pty Ltd and Jigsaw Humans Pty Ltd entered liquidation in April and May, respectively.
The companies will be wound up, notices published by Australian Securities and Investments Commission show.
Mr Fisher and Mr Heleta said the companies in liquidation related to a cafe they previously operated in the Canberra Centre that had been closed for several years.
Mr Fisher told The Canberra Times the liquidations would not affect the operations of the group's active venues.
Aaron Torline of Slaven Torline was appointed as liquidator for Hellfish Hospitality Pty Ltd and Jigsaw Humans Pty Ltd.
Mr Torline would not comment on the liquidations.
Hospitality struggles amid higher interest rates
The rise in interest rates and cost-of-living pressures had contributed to the group's struggles, Mr Fisher said.
"Interest rates rising is honestly probably the biggest challenge that we've ever gone through on the back end of everything else," he said.
"Many consumers have less money to spend so our revenue drops and then rising costs of goods. So our costs go up and obviously [our] rent doesn't go down."
But Mr Fisher said he was confident the businesses would survive.
"I think we're making all the right moves to get things back on track," he said.
