Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, August 25th: Health management paralysis, serious security risks and serious air pollution in guest rooms … … Does the "official bad review" cure the hotel "star" disease? — — Five-star hotels in many places were surveyed by "stars"
Xinhua News Agency reporters Chen Aiping, Zhou Wenchong and Yu Junjie
"The price is five stars, the facilities are 50% new, and the service does not take care." In recent years, some five-star hotels are not worthy of the name, which not only annoys consumers, but also is not conducive to further stimulating the potential of culture and tourism consumption.
On August 19th, the National Evaluation Committee of Tourist Star Hotels issued an announcement and decided to cancel the qualification of some five-star tourist hotels. What are the serious problems in hotels that have been "starred"? Is the "star-picking" treatment effective? Xinhua news agency reporters launched an investigation on this.
There are paralysis of hotel hygiene management, serious security risks, serious air pollution and noise pollution in guest rooms.
According to the information disclosed by the cultural tourism department, the five "star-picking" hotels are Tianjin Yanyuan International Hotel (formerly Sheraton Hotel), Tianjin Binhai Holiday Hotel, Shanghai Yujing Hotel, Chongqing Hilton Hotel and Days Hotel Chongqing Elegant; In addition, a number of hotels located in Liaoning, Chongqing, Shanghai, Tianjin and Henan were ordered to rectify within 12 months.
The reporter learned from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism that the main problems existing in this five-star hotel are as follows: First, the fire-fighting equipment is old and ineffective, the fire escape cannot be used normally, and the security and pool safety personnel are not in place. Second, the health problem is outstanding. Disinfection rooms are not equipped in place, and the sanitary management of public areas, guest rooms and restaurants is not up to standard. Third, some facilities and equipment can not be used normally due to poor maintenance, and the marking system is aging. Fourth, employees have a weak sense of service and insufficient service skills, so they cannot provide corresponding services in strict accordance with the standard requirements.
According to the reporter’s investigation, Days Hotel Chongqing Elegance, which is the star-picked, has some problems, such as no concierge service, poor room air quality, serious lack of maintenance in the background area, paralysis of health management and outdated facilities and equipment. Hilton Chongqing Hotel was also "star-picked" because of the lack of essential services, major security risks due to substandard health and fire protection, and irregular service.
Huang Tiemin, director of the Star Rating Committee of Shanghai Tourist Hotel, told the reporter that the problems of one "star-picked" hotel in Shanghai and five hotels that have to be rectified within a time limit are also concentrated on safety production management, hygienic operation norms, front-line staff service norms and the lack of necessary items.
According to the relevant person in charge of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, from January to July this year, the Ministry conducted unannounced visits to some five-star hotels in ten key provinces in three rounds, and cancelled the star rating of 20 five-star hotels.
Does the hotel care if "five stars" become "no stars"?
For a long time, being rated as "five-star" is considered as the guarantee of excellent hotel hardware and service quality. "Star-picking" makes "five stars" become "no stars", can it effectively touch the relevant substandard hotels to actively rectify?
A person in charge of a travel agency told reporters that hotels may lose some high-profit high-end demand markets after being "starred". After some high-end hotels "star-picking", the passenger flow dropped sharply.
Gu Huimin, president of beijing international studies university Institute of Tourism Science and a national star reviewer, believes that star rating is related to national standards, and "star-picking" means maintaining the authority of standards, maintaining the service quality of hotels, and ensuring the healthy development of the industry by "getting in and getting out".
However, many people in the industry also said that the influence of the current "star-picking" on high-end hotels has been significantly weakened. Even star-rated hotels take the initiative to apply for "star-picking" or "self-defining" as "luxury" to avoid the constraints of star rating standards.
The reporter found that a large number of hotels, especially high-end hotels, are outside the star rating system in China. According to Ying Liu, director of the Scenic Spot and Tourism Accommodation Industry Supervision Department of the Marketing Department of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, the Ministry of Commerce has counted more than 500,000 accommodation enterprises nationwide, while there are only 11,000 star-rated hotels. According to the reporter’s investigation, in Shanghai alone, the number of "luxury" hotels with "five-star price" is two or three times that of hotels with five-star rating. Some high-end hotels that were previously exposed to the existence of "bath towel to wipe the toilet" and "toilet brush to brush the teacup" have "no stars to pick".
In addition, due to information disclosure and other reasons, the pressure of "star-catching" is often not effectively transmitted to the market to form operational pressure, and many "bad-rated" hotels are still "like a cloud". The reporter found that Beijing Chang ‘an Hotel and Zibo Century Hotel, which were previously "star-picked", were still in tight demand, and the staff of a hot spring resort hotel in Beijing even told reporters that "the hotel price has not been adjusted after the star-picking".
Authority, professionalism and degree of marketization are the "shortcomings" of the star rating system.
The reporter learned from the person in charge of the relevant work of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism that china tourist hotels association is the specific undertaking unit for the current star rating and review, which is equivalent to the permanent office of the National Star Evaluation Committee.
"The star rating system faces the risk of continuing to slump." Zhang Rungang, vice president of china tourism association and president of china tourist hotels association, said frankly that at present, the hotel star rating standard can no longer meet the needs of industry development.
Dai Bin, president of china tourism academy, believes that there are no laws and regulations to follow in judging the standards and quality of tourist accommodation services in China at present, and they still mainly rely on industry practices, industry standards and enterprise self-inspection. Tourism law and other relevant laws and regulations only provide principles, and the punishment is not enough. In addition, experts also pointed out that many star rating agencies currently have legal hidden dangers of lack of certification qualifications.
According to Zhang Run Steel, the hotel star rating is a technical means of grading the accommodation industry, which is very professional. However, in reality, it is easily disturbed by other factors. For example, in some places, the relevant departments have spawned a large number of hotels that do not have the five-star conditions but are hard to open, which greatly weakens the gold content of the stars.
Insiders told reporters that the current practice is to determine the authority to evaluate the level of star-rated hotels according to the administrative level: the state evaluates five stars, the provincial level evaluates four stars, and the city evaluates three stars. Experts pointed out that such an approach is a "relic" of the past administrative-led model, which makes it difficult to effectively allocate resources and meet the needs of market development.
Experts such as Zhang Run Steel suggest that market-oriented reform is the way out for star rating system. First, the evaluation is carried out by a professional certification body with a high degree of marketization; Second, we should take the initiative to be included in the national certification and accreditation supervision system, and polish the "star brand" by promoting the marketization and specialization of star evaluation standards.
The Ministry of Culture and Tourism said that it will conduct unannounced inspections of five-star hotels with "full coverage, double randomness and normalization", and at the same time strengthen the guidance of standards and revise the national standard of "Classification and Evaluation of Star Rating of Tourist Hotels".
