Figures show London hotels have recovered from July bombings

London hotels have recovered from the aftermath of the July bombings, according to hotel performance analyst PKF's figures for December.

Revenue per available room (revpar) grew by 1.5% to £70.52 in the capital's hotels, as a 1.9% rise in room rate (to £102.40) counteracted a 0.4 percentage point fall in occupancy to 68.9%.

Although occupancy plummeted in July and August after 7 July, London hotels increased both revpar and room rate (by 1.89% and 3.4% respectively) for 2005 as a whole, although occupancy was down by 1.5 percentage points.

Regional hotels boosted revpar in December by 3.5% to £40.07 thanks to a 2.6% hike in average room rate (to £65.13) and a 0.9 percentage point increase in occupancy to 61.5%.

For the year, the provinces increased revpar by 3.6%, average room rate by 3.1% and occupancy by 0.4 percentage points.

However, Robert Barnard, partner for hotel consultancy services at PKF, said regional hotels were increasingly dependent on local events to drive occupancy.

"The soaring fortunes of cities with packed activity programmes such as Liverpool and Aberdeen contrasted strongly with locations such as Nottingham, Solihull and Birmingham Airport where rooms yield fell in 2005," he said.

By Angela Frewin

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