Hotel reviews on the web - is breakfast essential?
The ten most important factors for good scores!
London, 22 April 2009 - hotel.info, the free online hotel reservation service with 210,000 hotels around the world has published a "hit list" for the first time of what its guests consider to be the most important aspects of a good hotel rating. In first place on the list is the quality of breakfast which is considered to be significantly more important than friendly service, room size or parking charges.
Just a few years ago a single complaints' box for guests was usually the only discreet method of registering dissatisfaction with problems experienced in a hotel. No guest could ever be certain that their complaint would be read, let alone that it might lead to an improvement in the reported area.
Such attitudes now belong in the past - the Internet has revolutionised the way in which the hotel industry deals with complaints. Nowadays many hotel guests write about their experiences online, and booking portals publish these reports on their websites on the Internet.
hotel.info publishes the opinions of its customers not only as a standardised scale of marks, but also uses the comments written by the guests themselves. "These shed considerably more light on the actual situation in the hotel - whether in positive or negative terms," reports Timo Vavrinec, Head of Corporate Communication at hotel.de AG. "We have studied guests' comments relating to around one million hotel ratings, and for the first time can now reveal what guests consider to be the ten most important aspects of a good rating. The fact that the value for money of the breakfast on offer is the most often mentioned topic is a clear indicator that a good start to the day is high on the guests' agenda. Hotel managers who take this to heart have already gone a long way in winning over the minds of their guests."
The top 10 criteria are:
1. Breakfast: a breakfast that justifies the frequently high price in respect of both quality and quantity. Generous and wide-ranging selection. Fast seating and service for new guests.
2. Service/friendliness: guests from abroad attribute less importance to this factor. Domestic visitors who demand a high quality of service are more critical in this area.
3. Parking: appropriate parking or underground parking fees, the accuracy of the hotel's web site in relation to price and availability.
4. Noise: guests are less interested in a central location with corresponding levels of traffic, than in the sound-proofing of the room and windows.
5. Room size: sufficiently large rooms and bathrooms are important for North American guests in particular.
6. Internal/Wireless: availability of Internet and wireless connectivity, as well as moderate fees for usage.
7. Cleanliness: Clean rooms, especially bathrooms.
9. Non-smoking/smoking: Clear distinction between smokers and non-smokers (smell of smoke on non-smoking floors). If non-smoking rooms are requested they must also be available.
10. Category/Stars: Each hotel's overall impression must reflect the stated star rating/category. This plays a relatively large role in the guests' perception of value for money.
Timo Vavrinec continues, "Particularly in these times of crisis, travellers pay attention to what they are getting for their money. Experience shows that potential guests rely heavily on the impressions of fellow travellers. For this reason at hotel.info only people who have actually stayed at the hotel can give a rating. Additionally the score received by the hotel effects its listing on the hotel.info web site. The comments made represent a real opportunity for hoteliers to improve and increase revenue. We encourage hoteliers to take a proactive stance in reviewing their hotel ratings as a regular quality management activity, to obtain a true and unaltered impression of their guests' levels of satisfaction. Hotel ratings thus provide a real opportunity for both parties through this direct customer feedback.
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hotel.info
www.hotel.info is a free hotel reservations service for corporate and private customers. The service offers more than 210,000 hotels for electronic bookings around the world. Customers booking via hotel.info achieve significantly better prices in comparison with other booking channels. In addition, hotel.info shows all available room prices for each hotel, so that the customer can always select the cheapest or most suitable room price. All bookings via hotel.info are transferred simultaneously, securely and directly to the respective hotel’s computer. This guarantees the unique integration of each hotel’s own reservation systems (CRS or PMS) and hotel.de’s own reservation system myRES into the hotel.info unified user interface.
At hotel.info, customers seeking hotel rooms can base their decisions to book a room not only on the core information such as room price and hotel facilities, but also on the hotel reviews and ratings submitted by hundreds of thousands of hotel guests from around the world. Compared with existing rating portals, hotel.info customers can rely on 100% genuine hotel ratings, since only customers who have booked and recently stayed in each hotel are asked for their opinion. Once a customer has selected an offer, the hotel is presented for direct online booking at attractive conditions, in line with the hotel.info "Check & Book" claim.
hotel.info is the international brand of hotel.de AG. This brand was created to further drive expansion within Europe. The aim is to establish hotel.info in foreign markets and then successively throughout Europe as the leading reservation service for corporate and private customers.
Press contact
Ms. Warini Munshi
hotel.info hotel booking Ltd.
Longcroft House
2-8 Victoria Avenue
London, EC2M 4NS
Great Britain
Phone:+44-(0)20-32061430
Fax: +44-(0)20-80431108
E-Mail: press@hotel.info
URL: www.hotel.info
