Re:locate magazine | Employee Support | Property | Serviced Accommodation

From the end of June of this year, anyone receiving information from serviced accommodation providers may notice a new logo on the literature they receive. This, together with a number of stars, will denote how the accommodation has been rated by Quality in Tourism, an independent company that Visit Britain – the UK’s tourist organisation – has hired to assess those serviced accommodation providers that sign up to the scheme. Lorna Keen is Chairman of the Association of Serviced Apartment Providers (ASAP). She says, “This is a very exciting development for the industry, and one that’s been in gestation for the last couple of years. The growth in popularity of serviced accommodation – not just for corporates but for tourists, too – plus the growth in the number of apartments on offer meant it was time to find a way of assessing apartments, so the clients know what they’re buying into.”

Fifteen members of the ASAP, who between them are responsible for some 4,000 apartments, have already signed up to the scheme, with Lorna Keen estimating that they’ll have been awarded their star rating by the end of 2008. That may seem like a massive number to get through in a relatively short time but, as Ms Keen explains, assessors will only look at a small sample of properties – including one chosen randomly – within blocks of many, if these are all owned by the same company.

Lucy Talbot is Sales and Marketing Manager at Quality in Tourism, the company responsible for assessing the units. “So far, we’ve been pleasantly surprised by the standard of accommodation on offer,” she says. “I think what’s so right about this type of assessment for the industry is that, previously, the only slot serviced accommodation fitted into was the ‘self-catering’ one, something that suggests it offers clients little beyond their own temporary front door and fridge. It needed a ratings system that took into account the kind of ‘hands-on’ concierge-based service that can have a chilled bottle of champagne waiting for clients. At the end of the day, most people are familiar with star ratings through the hotel industry – it’s about quality assurance and managing expectation, as well as legitimising a burgeoning industry.”

She says that what’s particularly impressed her about working on the new assessments has been the industry’s willingness to embrace the scheme. “It’s incredibly refreshing to work with a group that says, ‘Yup, please do come and see exactly what it is we’ve got to offer.’ The ASAP is clearly using the process to drive improvement and recognition. And it’s got nothing to lose because, from an HR & Procurement manager’s point of view, there’s a place for every standard of accommodation, given the different requirements of employees, so there’s as defined a need for one-star accommodation as there is for five.”

Director of Sales & Marketing at BridgeStreet Worldwide,
Jo Layton, explains why her organisation was keen to pioneer the new grading system. “The idea of an industry-wide grading system emerged when we met with Quality in Tourism more than two years ago to discuss the grading of The Atrium by BridgeStreet Worldwide Apartments in Manchester,” she says. “Our discussions with Quality in Tourism led us to conclude that the industry would benefit from a formal grading system against which all providers could be measured. The concept, championed by BridgeStreet, was presented to the Association of Serviced Apartment Providers, which immediately adopted the idea and has spent the last two years developing the system with Quality in Tourism.”

As with the hotel industry, the grading system provides universal frames of reference for the intrinsic quality of apartments’ fixtures and fittings, cleanliness and general services. Check-in and arrival processes, as well as health and safety systems, are also tested, to ensure they reach a recognised industry standard.

“The new system is less about achieving the highest number of stars for our apartments,” says Jo Layton, “but more about offering travellers an independent, reliable and objective rating against which to judge each serviced apartment provider. We at BridgeStreet believe that, over time, corporate buyers will only entertain working with serviced apartment providers who have submitted their inventory to scrutiny in this way, especially as each grade also affords an instant indication of the property’s quality and price ratio.”

If the star-rating system is an initiative designed to help clients manage expectations, however, there may be challenges ahead. What a tourist expects from a hotel is very different from what a relocatee, human resources professional or relocation agent expects or considers essential from serviced accommodation. Were these groups to devise a star rating themselves, rather than looking at quality of furnishings, in-house amenities and proximity of those outside their temporary front door, arguably they would be more likely to value one based on an additional range of criteria. An HR manager or relocation agent, for instance, might well be equally concerned with cost, level of services and amenities provided in relation to level of employee and their business needs, flexibility of booking and payment options, and the reliability of the serviced accommodation provider.

But Jo Layton argues, “The booking, arrival, terms and conditions and other key processes do form part of the accreditation process.”

George Westwell is Group Director of the Cheval Group, a high-end luxury serviced apartment company that has just celebrated its 25th anniversary. “As far as the market goes, we’re pretty unique,” he says. “We have 285 apartments across London, each of which we own and operate, and our minimum stays range from seven to 90 days. Our clientele is almost exclusively drawn from the business market, including the worlds of IT, banking, law and entertainment. Those staying with us tend to have a high-net worth.”

The concept of ‘home-from-home’ to a Cheval client, then, is a decidedly luxurious one, which, George Westwell explains, is why the new star-rating system is not currently appropriate for his company.

“I feel that the new rating system is not specifically designed for the serviced apartment market. It doesn’t have a ‘sample apartment product’ as a point of reference for each level of grading. Its current classification framework is established mainly to look at the lowest common denominator and the most basic apartment product on the market. For example, one of the current minimum assessment criteria outlined is that you must have ‘at least one bathroom and WC for every eight guests’, and to be classified as a three-star property ‘where more than six guests are accommodated, a shower should be available’. While this definition may be relevant to a self-catering property, it isn’t applicable to a high-end dedicated serviced apartment. All of our properties offer apartments that have en-suite bathrooms for each bedroom in the apartment, along with a guest cloakroom for entertaining.

“The classification guides are too broad in my opinion, and are not dedicated to the serviced apartment market. As the system stands, it isn’t specific or detailed enough to accurately assess and grade the wide range of properties that come underneath the ‘serviced apartment’ banner. I would like to see more detailed classification yardsticks, and also a move towards establishing a ‘typical’ apartment product.

“It would be beneficial to go out into the market to find a typical product for each level of grading. This would be used as a guideline to clearly illustrate what a one, two, three, four and five star serviced apartment product should be, and what operators should be working towards.”

With arguments both for and against the new grading system, then, it seems that it’s only once it’s been around for at least some time that its strengths and witnesses will be fully visible.

Charles McCrow, Managing Director of The Apartment Service, arguably speaks for the middle way:

“We’ve signed up to the ratings system because we believe the concept’s great and long overdue since The Apartment Service sponsored grading of UK Serviced Apartments by Egon Ronay’s Hotel & Restaurant Guides throughout the 1990s. That said, we do, of course, appreciate in the ASAP that you can’t devise a ratings system to suit everyone; what we’re doing in these initial stages is trying to fit triangles into squares – some serviced apartments won’t fit easily within the current ratings system, but they will at least fit. On the plus side, the issue is now firmly on the industry agenda, and we’ve at last got something in place again that we’ll be able to refine as time goes on. And, as far as our end-users – our clients – are concerned, the fact that they now have some idea of what they’ll be getting from us before they sign on the dotted line can only be good news.”

© 2007. Article taken from pages 16-18 of the summer 2007 edition of Re:locate magazine, published by Profile Locations, Spray Hill, Hastings Road, Lamberhurst, Kent TN3 8JB. All rights reserved. This publication (or any part thereof) may not be reproduced in any form without the prior written permission of Profile Locations. Profile Locations accepts no liability for the accuracy of the contents or any opinions expressed herein.