While many hotels and restaurants in Ho Chi Minh City have been caught having female attendants offer erotic services to guests behind closed doors, a deputy leader of the municipal administration has admitted that there are no way to completely crack down on such illegal practices.

The ‘erotic services,’ involving women wearing scanty clothes while performing provocative dances before their patrons, are in fact not considered prostitution, as far as the current laws are concerned, Nguyen Thi Thu, deputy chairwoman of the city’s administration, said at a meeting on Monday.

“This means any establishments caught offering erotic services will only be subject to administrative fines, and there are no legal frameworks to criminally charge them,” Thu was quoted by the official Voice of Vietnam radio as saying.

As the civil punishments are toothless, those hotels and restaurants may easily repeat their violations shortly after paying their fines, the deputy chairwoman admitted.

Even when a hotel has its business license revoked for repeated violations, the facility owner would still manage to have someone apply for a new permit to resume operations, Thu added.

Ho Chi Minh City authorities have strengthened inspections and crackdowns on erotic services at hotels and restaurants citywide.

In mid-May, police raided the Dmax Restaurant on Ton That Tung Street in District 1, discovering dozens of suggestively-dressed female employees serving their guests in erotic manners inside 20 ‘VIP rooms.'

The crackdown came only days after police officers swooped on RUBY, another restaurant on Ton That Tung Street, finding many female employees, dressed in revealing outfits, drinking and singing karaoke with their guests inside VIP rooms.