Hotel advisors need a career change

Comment by Jeremy Skidmore (www.jeremyskidmore.com)

There can be few things worse for a hotel than being on a list of the dirtiest places in the UK.

You can say a hotel is cheap, or chintzy, or lacking in facilities. But when you say it’s dirty, it sends a shiver down your spine. Your mind works overtime on thinking of some of the disgusting things that may have been left in those rooms.

You also alienate at least half the population. Men will often get their heads down in some dodgy places, but I’ve yet to meet a woman who will go near a place that has been tagged as dirty.

So TripAdvisor’s roll call of the top ten dirtiest hotels, based on comments and votes from the people who have stayed in these establishments, would, you would think, have hoteliers living in fear of making the list.

Not so. Incredibly, many on that list are repeat offenders.

Four Britannia properties were there for the second year running and the worst property, the Nanford Guest House, jumped from second to top spot on the roll of shame.

Who on earth is running these places? To ignore the problem sends out a clear message: we don’t give a toss about our customers.

This perception was enhanced by some extraordinary PR (or lack of it) from the hotels involved. The people advising these places need a career change.

Representatives from Nanford and Britannia refused point blank to discuss the matter with journalists.

This falls into the ‘let’s not talk to the press and then they won’t be able to write anything’ school of thinking. That’s a very backward school.

Instead, some damage limitation PR may just convince people that you do give a damn about cleanliness.

They should be telling people that they take the situation very seriously, will thoroughly investigate, and do not under any circumstances condone a dirty room.

They should also put it into some sort of perspective. I’m not for a moment condoning a dirty establishment, but opinions can be very subjective and people often expect the earth when they’ve paid very little for a room.

It was left to Nick Cust, the joint managing director of Superbreak and a respected domestic operator, to say: “We send a lot of people to Britannia hotels and in general they are good value for money.”

Overall satisfaction levels at Britannia may well be very reasonable, but why is it left to Nick to effectively do the company’s PR?

When you repeatedly feature on a list of the top ten dirtiest hotels in the UK and refuse to say anything, it sends out a clear message: you don’t give a damn about customers and their opinions.

Whether it is true or not is irrelevant. That’s the perception and we all know that perception is more important than reality.

Successful businesses do not treat their customers with such contempt.