If there is something that irritates me.....

One thing that personally irritates me is when someone offers to look into something for you and they let you down by not coming back to you as promised.

As you know I have been looking into accessible accommodation that is offered by UK hotels and one chain that has caught my eye is Premier Inn, who have sent me a spreadsheet with 618 hotels.  There are 50+ new hotels that date back to December 2014 that don't appear and so I am not sure how updated this list is. 

Premier Inn Great Yarmouth

Last week I was messaging with someone from Premier Inn about hotel information for several newer hotels that are not on their spreadsheet and they included London City Aldgate (opened December 2014), Cambridge City East (opened December 2014), Winchester (opened December 2014), Birkenhead Town Centre (opened December 2014), London Bexleyheath (opened January 2015), Great Yarmouth (opened March 2015) and Southend-on-Sea (opened February 2015).  

The information that I was looking for was regarding the number of accessible rooms and what bathroom facilities each hotel offered.  Being that all these hotels are new builds they should all comply 100% with the Building Regulations.  For those of you that are unaware the regulations state that for every 20 normal rooms there should be 1 wheelchair accessible room and where there are several accessible rooms there should be a choice of bathroom facilities.
I know I could phone each new hotel but that would be expensive at 13p per minute and no guarantee that a member of staff would no the answer.  I have phoned in the past and staff are unsure and I have been told to call back later to speak with someone else.  I have also been put on hold and cut off.  It wouldn't be so bad if you could email the hotel but you can't and so I have asked through twitter.
I hope that someone reads this and delivers what they have promised.

My research into Yorkshire hotels

Recently Premier Inn sent me via email a spreadsheet that contains over 600+ hotels, which has helped me to carry out research on the accessibility of each hotel.  The last week or so I have looked at 41 hotels in Yorkshire with a mixture of results. 
Fourteen hotels which have 983 rooms of which 54 are AB (disabled) rooms, which have either 24 lowered bath with overhead shower and 30 have wetrooms.  This calculates as 5.49% which is the more rooms than the Building Regulations reccommends.

Bradford South

Of these hotels 8 are fully compliant because they have the correct number of AB rooms and offer a choice of lowered bath and overhead shower or a full wetroom.  The hotels are Rotherham East,  Wakefield City North, Huddersfield West, Huddersfield Central, Harrogate South, Halifax West, Bradford South and Bradford North.
The remaining 6 are partially compliant because they may not have the correct number of rooms or offer a choice of bathroom facilities and these are Hull West, Leeds City Centre (Arena), Hull North, Hull City Centre, Doncaster Central (High Fishergate) and Leeds East.
Thirteen hotels that I researched only give the number of guestrooms which total 1,110.  Of this group of hotels 7 do not give anymore information regarding bathroom facilities.  Sheffield-Barnsley and Goole hotels only offer lowered bath with overhead shower facilities but no wetrooms.  Sheffield City Centre, Bradford Central and Barnsley Central (M1, Jct 37) only offer wetroom facilities.  The spreadsheet entry for Huddersfield North says "disabled facilities available on request".
Of the 41 hotels 6 only give the number of AB (disabled) rooms which total 24.  Barnsley Dearne Valley and York City offer a choice of bathroom facilities.  Leeds South (Birstall), Sheffield City Centre Angel Street and Wakefield Central hotels offer only a lowered bath with overhead shower.  York North offers wetrooms only. 
Finally 8 hotels have absolutely no guestroom information.  Of these hotels 2 have information relating facilities while Doncaster Lakeside has only lowered bath with overhead shower.  Wakefield South (M1, Jct 39) offers 4 wetrooms.  The remaining hotels have no information on facilities.
As I have previously said in earlier posts it is a shame that hotel chains such as Prremier Inn do not give out accessibility information on their own websites.  All their sites have the same generic information which is very frustrating if you are looking for specific information.  The advice I was given by one hotel is to book a AB room online and then call the hotel to secure the type of bathroom facilility you need and that is all very well and good if they offer the type of bathroom facilities you require but if they don't you then have to cancel that reservation and look for another hotel that does.  This process can be very frustrating and can be costly at 13p per minute plus your operator costs. I have also have several frustrating calls to hotels where the staff on the desk do not know how many disabled rooms they have or what bathroom facilities and I was asked to call the desk later that day.  This is totally unacceptable especiallly if you are trying to find out facilities prior to booking and taking advantage of saver rates and offers. 
Disabled people spend a lot of money on leisure and it always feels as if there are a multitude of obstacles in their way when it comes to booking hotels in general and it wouldn't hurt for hotels to have information on accessible rooms and bathroom facilities available on websites, maybe one dy someone will take note and make changes for the better.

Source: Premier Inn spreadsheet, Direct Rooms.

Manchester Premier Inn Accessible Room Information

I have been researching and compiling a list of accessible rooms and facilities that are available at Premier Inn hotels in Manchester.  I have looked at 28 hotels that are in Manchester and the surrounding area.
Nine hotels which are City Centre (Deansgate Locks), Handforth, Cheadle, Wilmslow, Didsbury, Trafford Centre North, Salford Quays, Manchester Airport and City Centre Portland Street have a total of 939 rooms and of those 47 are AB rooms (disabled).  If totaled together they comply with the Building Regulations of 5% which is 46.95%.  However, 8 of these rooms are lowered bath with overhead shower and only 1 offers a wetroom.  None of the above hotels offer a choice of bathroom facilities and the Building Regulations state that where possible hotels should offer a choice of facilities. 
Eight hotels which are Bury, Altrincham, Prestwich, Denton, Heaton Park, Hyde, Manchester Central and Manchester Airport (Heald Green) have a total of 633 rooms and none give numbers of AB rooms.  The Premier Inn spreadsheet shows that 6 of these hotels do not offer wetrooms and 1 hotel (Bury) has 6 wetrooms, while Altrincham has no information regarding AB rooms or facilities. 
Five hotels which are Trafford Centre South, Swinton, Salford Central, Oldham Broadway, Manchester North have no room numbers or AB room information.  Six hotels which are Manchester Old Trafford, Sale, City Centre (Arena/Printworks), Manchester North, City Centre (Picadilly) only gives the numbers of AB rooms which total 46. Of the hotels 3 offer lowered bath with overhead shower a total of 15 bathrooms while 2 offer wetrooms a total of 21 and 1 hotel offers an equal number of bathrooms and wetrooms (5 each). 
Due to the lack of available information on these 28 hotels whether from their spreadsheet, websites or third parties I was only able to get total rooms for 17 hotels and AB room totals for 15 hotels.  Twenty percent of hotels have absolutely no imformation.  The information superhighway is suppose to be a way in which we share information electronically and I would have thought that someone like Premier Inn would have taken adavantage of this by giving their customers the best information via their website but in my opinion they fall far short of this.  As I have previously written all their websites give the same generic information.  I had to visit other sites to find out how many rooms each hotel had and had to take the AB room information from their spreadsheet which often gives partial information and maybe incorrect.
The spreadsheet that I was forwarded lists 618 hotels and the list does not include their newest hotels of which I know there are at least 51 which were opened between December 2014 and present day.  These 51 hotels are all in the UK and should comly fully with the Building Regulations of one in twenty rooms should be accessible and each hotel should offer a choice of bathroom facilities.  I know that some hotels are of listed or historic interest and therefore maynot comply but a large number of their hotels are built to order and there is no reason why they should not comply.  I have contacted Premier Inn regarding their new hotels and await to hear from them.  I hope this is of interest to those of us who are disabled and would find life so much easier if this information was freely available. 

Sources:
Premier Inn spreadsheet.  Premier Inn Websites, Directrooms.com and Booking.com

Premier Inn London Hotels

If you have read my previous posts you will already know that I am doing my own research into hotels and one area is accessible accommodation.  One hotel chain that I have been researching is Premier Inn.

Premier Inn London County Hall

I have started by looking at 44 London hotels which have 6,570 rooms of which 319 are accessible rooms.  Only 8 hotels the Angel Islington, City (Old Street), County Hall, Dagenham, Gatwick Manor Royal, Greenwich, Richmond and Stratford have the correct number of accessible rooms as laid out in the Building Regulations. The regulations state that their should be one wheelchair accessible room for every twenty hotel rooms or thereof.  These hotels also offered a choice of lowered bath with overhead shower or a wetroom.
There are 6 hotels which do not have the required number of accessible rooms for them to

Premier Inn Hampstead

comply with the regulations and of the rooms that are available they do not offer a choice of bathroom facilities.  They offer either a lowered bath with overhead shower or a wetroom.  These hotels are Beckton, Hammersmith, Hampstead, Hanger Lane, Kensington (Olympia) and Waterloo.
There are 9 hotels that have the correct number of wheelchair accessible rooms.  However, they do not offer a choice of bathroom facilities, they either have a lowered bath with overhead shower or a wetroom.  These hotels are City (Tower Hill), Elstree/Borehamwood, Docklands Excel, Edgware, Gatwick Airport A23, Gatwick Airport South, Southwark Borough Market, Southwark Tate Modern and Wimbledon South.
I have also looked at 11 new builds which have opened between December 2014 and February 2016.  By all rights these hotels should comply fully and give choice of bathroom facilities.  The new builds are Aldgate, Bexleyheath, Kingston upon Thames, Lewisham, Romford, St Pancras, Uxbridge, Holborn, Edmonton, Brentford and Sidcup.
There are 10 hotels that I have been unable to research fully as information relating to them is pretty vague and they are Blackfriars, Euston, Gatwick Airport East, Harrow, Kew, Kings Cross, Leicester Square, Putney Bridge, Tower Bridge and Victoria.
I have to say that with only a few hotels being fully compliant and others only being partial I was suprised that they achieved 4.85% of their rooms being accessible.  It is a shame that some hotels only offer one type of bathroom facility and not a choice, for someone like myself having only one type of bathroom facility often means the decision is made for me.  This means that I am often further away from my destination than I origionally planned or I may have chosen to go with another hotel chain that can offer a hotel with the right facilities near to my destination.  It hard to be a loyal customer when these types of obstacles are put in your way.

Source: Premier Inn Database, Booking.com

The Purple Pound

Firstly, I am a person with a disablility who is passionate about equality and awareness and trying to make a difference for others.  I generally see a lot of inequality around me in my daily life and I can't change everything but what I can do is try to make a difference by tackling one thing at a time.  Even if that is campaigning  for signage to be put up at four designated disabled bays at a HIEX Hotel.

I have spent many nights in hotels and one problem is that many of them do not have the required number of accessible rooms that the Building Regulations state.  I accept that some hotels are listed or are of historical interest but when a fairly new hotel fails to comply with the one in twenty room ratio it annoys me. I think that the majority of hotel chains are missing a trick by not having more accessible rooms and grades. 

They don't appear to have notice the potential spending power that many disabled people have often referred to as the purple pound. The 11 million or so disabled people living in the UK have billions and billions of disposable income which makes them an economic force and should not be forgotten.

I am always looking at new hotels that are being built as these should be complying with not only the number of accessible rooms but they should also offer wetroom or bathroom with bathtub in equal numbers. 

Thhe Premier Inn has fifteen new hotels that are opening in the next six months.  February sees the opening of London Archway, Edinburgh City Centre (Royal Mile), hub by Premier Inn Edinburgh Royal Mile, hub by Premier Inn London Spitalfields, Bristol City Centre (Lewins Mead), Felixstowe Town Centre, Newcastle City Centre (The Gate), London Sidcup and Portsmouth Havant South (Langstone/A27). While March sees the opening of Buxton, Penrith and Ware.  May has two more hotels opening and they are Matlock and Edinburgh City Centre (York Place). June has Newport City Centre (Wales).  I will be interested to see if these new builds comply with the standards set out by Building Regulations.  I know that the Premier Inn in Bexleyheath which opened just over a year ago does comply fully and does offer both a wetroom or a bathroom with lowered bathtub.  

IHG brand hotels which include the Holiday Inn, Holiday Inn Express and Hotel Indigo are opening new hotels this year in London, Manchester and Edinburgh to name a few.  

All my life I have contributed to society and I see myself as equal to the next person but sometimes I feel that I am definately not an equal.  It shouldn't take building regulations to force hotels to include more accessible rooms into their future plans.  There is a large community of disabled people who do not require the use of a wheelchair but require the use of a wetroom or walk-in shower because they may not be able to use a bath because of poor upper body strength or injury. Space is not required to accommodate a wheelchair and so the size of the bedroom area could be reduced to that of a standard room or equivalent grade.  This would mean that a room designed with walking disabled in mind could be universally used by all guests not just ones with a disability.

I have read many hotel reviews by disabled hotel guests and the one question that everyone seems to have is who designs these accessible rooms because the designers don't seem to have any understanding of disability.  Is that the fault of the hotel or the architects I don't know but maybe they should actually ask some disabled guests what they would like to see in a room.  I would like to see more twin accessible rooms or zip-lock beds so that you can share with a friend not everyone is travelling with a partner.  I would like to see better staff training of disability as I feel that staff are often unsure of how to approach a disabled person and I understand but really we won't bite!  We are are like any other guest and just want to be treated the same.

 

  

Holiday Inn Wrexham get yourself sorted!

Today (11th February) I was looking for new hotels opening this year and I came across several hotels that belong to the IHG brand.  I have stayed in many hotels over the years within the IHG brand portfolio and I am a Gold Elite member and I know that doesn't mean much but it shows a degree of loyalty from me.  

One hotels official website was the Holiday Inn Wrexham and I was able to find most of what I was looking for but for a small piece of information.  On the page was a link to email the hotel and I thought great lets give it ago.  Being disabled I wanted to know whether the accessible rooms had a roll-in shower (wetroom) or had a bathroom with a lowered bathtub and grab rails or offered the choice.  I know rooms are not available until 1st May but that should not stop them answering queries from likely guests.

I didn't get a reply from the hotel but from the postmaster to say "that the group info only  accepts messages from people in its organization or on its allowed senders list, and your email address isn't on the list".  It took several minutes to actually sink in and to say that I was furious was an understatement.  Why put a link in the public domain if it is only meant for their own people to use it does not make sense to me.  I was looking at making a possible booking later in the year but without the information I require that won't happen.  This is how to loose customers.

 

 

Designing a new template for hotel accessibility

Being a frequent hotel guest I feel I can give an honest opinion of accessible rooms and facilities and pass on suggestions on what could be improved to improve the experience for

Premier Inn

future guests.  Accessible rooms are generally akin to standard hotel rooms and it is the practice of most hotels to remove furniture such as sofas, comfy chairs and small tables to give the illusion of a larger space and leaving its occupants with the bare minimum.  The Premier Inn have stated on their website that if an accessible room is a bit on the small size they replace the kingsize bed with a standard double bed.  This practice is unfair and where is the equality in this act? 
Accessible bathroom facilities don't fare much better with most looking clinical and functional at best.  Many are tiled white with no imagination.  The bathrooms are either a wheel-in shower or a lowered bathtub with grab rails.  A lot of disabled people out there wonder who was the bright spark who thought it was a good idea to put bathtubs in these bathrooms.  In   my

Holiday Inn

opinion whoever the person was did not do enough research into the clientele who would using the facilities.  Not everyone has the ability or upper body strength to transfer using bath boards.   
It often feels from personal experience that walking disabled guests requirements are largely ignored.  Often we do not require the extra space to manoeuvre around a room but do need the facilities that a wheel-in (walk in) shower can provide.  
When the facilities allow I always opt to stay in a normal guest accommodation because it offers me more choice of room grade and extras like access to private lounges, extra room facilities and often better location within the hotel.  Disabled people often chunter on about equality but that will only happen if they stand up for their rights.  That is why I believe that the solution is a guest room that can be designed for use by both disabled and non-disabled guests with a bathroom facilities that offer both bathtub and a walk-in shower.  
It was last summer (2015) that I first became aware of the possibility of a competition which would be run by RIBA for an architect to design an attractive accessible hotel room template or a room template that can be easily altered for a disabled guest.  The Premier Inn was mentioned as a possible partner but that was not confirmed.  
Apparently hoteliers such as the Premier Inn, IHG, Hilton Hotels and Millennium Hotels amongst others do not want rooms to look "medical" in anyway.  I am not the biggest fan of accessible guest accommodation in hotels but I would never describe it as looking "medical"; spartan maybe but not "medical".  
It doesn't help that that groups such as a  Inclusive hotels group who generally meet every one or two months in London to discuss and work on guidance and how to present it to hotel groups.  This group is made up of designers, access professionals, occupational therapists and supply specialists.  I bet there is not one disabled person amongst this select group of individuals and that is what irritates me the most is the do-gooders or people who have been on a course or to university and think they know what it is like to be disabled, I always say "walk in my shoes for one day" no one can possibly know what obstacles and challenges we face daily and the mental and physical effort it takes to do the simplest of tasks.  

Moving forward to December (2015) and I received another email telling me that the design

Premier Inn ???

competition was going to be launched shortly and is in conjunction with a hotel chain; could this be the Premier Inn I ask?  I was asked if I would submit my thoughts on what I look for in a successful hotel stay.  I was chuffed to think that I had been asked to contribute my views and was asked to do this as soon as possible because a broad agreement on the competition had been made.  I sent my document a couple of days later and awaited feedback but  I heard nothing for sometime until I sent a email. The feedback I received had said it was "extremely useful" and being of a curious nature I replied to ask how it was useful to them and I was taken aback by the reply which said that I was more concerned with luxury and comfort and they were so concerned whether they can use the loo and therefore they did not notice the ambiance of the room.  Another email waffled on about about rules of the competition being drawn up and the not knowing what the guidance would include.
I am so angry and feel used by a person who I thought had the same ideas about equality for disabled people in our society being disabled themselves.  Accessibility had brought us in contact and it had inspired me to do more as a campaigner for disability rights to try and make a difference.  I am exasperated knowing that I can do nothing about the way I was used and I do not know if or how my suggestions on a successful hotel may be used in the future.  I submitted that document in good faith and expected nothing back and in hindsight I should have asked questions when I was approached; I have learnt a valuble lesson here.
Finally, I do not know what they thought I was going write about hotels but for me accessible bathrooms are generally the same large, clean and adequate wherever you stay and especially in chain hotels, so I do not understand their loo comment.  I do not believe I have done anything wrong in wanting comfort and luxury when staying in a hotels; after all isn't that what equality is about.  There is a lot more in my document so if anyone would like to read my thoughs on a successful hotel stay I will post it.