Hoteliers told of Net assets

Hotels must not ignore the Internet as a key source of business in the future, the Hotel Industry Marketing Group (HIMG) has warned.

The advice to hoteliers to get on the worldwide network came as research by the group showed that one-third of UK business travellers say they will want to book hotels via the Internet within five years.

A HIMG spokeswoman said a surprising result of the survey of about 500 business travellers was that interest in the Internet was not confined to a single group.

"One could have expected that young, wealthy males who travel a lot would be those to express most interest," she said. "But the figures show that regardless of sex, income and whether travellers stay at five-star hotels or budget lodges, everybody is saying they will use the Internet to book hotels."

Among the hotel groups already benefiting from Internet bookings is upmarket consortium Pride of Britain.

The organisation went on to the system last summer and although business through it was slow to begin with, it has rocketed in the past two months.

Pride of Britain took 60 bookings from the Internet for its members in February and 51 in March.