Earlier this year it was named as
Britain's worst hotel chain for the sixth year in a row by Which? magazine. And
this shoddy hotel chain has featured several times right here on The Customer
Service Blog for their appalling customer service.
But complaints about broken toilets,
dirty rooms, peeling paint, and rude staff, have not affected profits at the
Britannia Hotels group, which are incredibly going up!
Accounts filed recently at Companies
House reveal that sales for the year ending 31st March 2018, were up by 4% to £96.9 million, and pre-tax profits
rose from £19 million to £20.6 million.
Investigators for Which? magazine
stayed at Britannia's Royal Albion hotel in Brighton and found dirty carpets
and peeling wallpaper. The magazine's Travel editor Rory Boland said:
“Britannia has superb locations, fabulous buildings, but terrible hotels.” And
last June, the company was fined a whopping £265,000 for seven breaches of food
safety and hygiene offences at the Adelphi Hotel in Liverpool (pictured above).
So why on earth are Britannia Hotels
doing so well financially?
Cutting corners to reduce costs is
obviously profitable in the short term. But it’s a ‘race to the bottom’ when
you try to increase profits while offering poor service. Sooner or later, discerning customers will get fed-up with being treated badly and eventually they
will opt to pay a bit more money for a better quality experience.
Britannia Hotels need to learn this important business lesson. You can increase your profits in the short-term by cutting costs. But poor quality and poor customer
service always comes back to bite you in the end.