Public Servant Lifestyle

The National Tourist Boards of England, Scotland and Wales, AA and RAC announce new common accommodation standards for the hotel trade.

The AA, RAC, VisitBritain, VisitScotland and the Wales Tourist Board have reached an historic agreement to rate serviced accommodation using a common set of standards. This is the first time that a single method of assessing and rating serviced accommodation will be used by the organisations across Britain and it will be introduced progressively following the start of assessments in January 2006.

Replacing the schemes previously operated by each individual body, the new common standards have been jointly created by all organisations. The new standards for hotels and guest accommodation will be represented by stars ranging from one to five and will fully reflect consumer expectations and meet industry needs. A higher star rating will be awarded for increasingly enhanced level of quality across all areas, including range of facilities and services available.

The new common set of standards follows extensive consumer and industry research indicating the need to clarify and simplify the existing ratings.

They provide the benchmark for the consumer to make an informed choice and will also make it easier for tourism bodies and the travel industry to promote serviced accommodation both at home and overseas.

Stars

Irrespective of which organisation assesses an establishment the rating awarded will be the same.

Stars will be used as the rating symbol for hotels and guest accommodation as they have been identified as the most widely accepted indicator of accommodation quality.

To avoid any confusion, establishments with hotel in their name will automatically be assessed under the hotel criteria. This may mean that serviced accommodation previously rated as guest accommodation, will now be rated as hotels. This policy has already worked successfully in Wales.

Serviced accommodation will be divided into three categories, each with its own specific set of criteria and standards for rating.

The three categories will be:

Hotel

‘Hotel’- including the designators; ‘Country House Hotel’, ‘Small Hotel’, ‘Town House Hotel’ and an entirely new category to be called ‘Metro Hotel’. These will be rated on a scale of 1 to 5 Stars

Guest Accommodation

‘Guest Accommodation’ including the designators ‘Bed & Breakfast’, ‘Guest House’, ‘Farmhouse’, ‘Inn’, and ‘Restaurant with Rooms’. These will also be rated on a scale of 1 to 5 Stars

Budget Hotel

‘Budget Hotel’ will be the designator used to embrace the strongly branded, chain accommodation where bedroom style, facilities and quality are uniform across all outlets, e.g. Travelodge. Because of their strong branding, this category of accommodation will not be star rated, but will still be subject to an inspection regime.

Metro Hotels

Hotel accommodation will have five sub categories/designators including the new ‘Metro Hotel’, which is a town/city hotel providing full hotel services with the exception of dinner. Guest accommodation will have six sub categories/designators e.g. ‘Inns’ must have accommodation provided in a fully licensed establishment with a bar for non-residents and food provided at lunchtime and in the evenings. On signage and on print, the appropriate sub categories/designators will be listed to help the consumer.

All accommodation will be assessed on an annual basis from January next year, with a full overnight assessment undertaken at least every three years. Details of the criteria used in these assessments will be available later in the year.

UK Hotels – Facts & Figures

In 2003, the turnover of the UK hotel industry was £10.9 billion. This represented an increase of 4% compared to 2002.*

In 2004, average room occupancy for all serviced accommodation throughout the UK was 61% (up 2% from 2003). Average bed space occupancy was 45% (an increase of 1% on 2003).*

*Figures supplied by the British Tourist Authority

More information available in Hotels