UK hotels slow to recover from disaster year

The UK hotel industry is failing to recover from the battering it took last year, according to the latest figures from two leading consultants.

Despite increases in occupancy, room rate and revenue per available room (revpar) last month, figures for the same period in 2003 were well down on April 2002.

Data from both PKF and TRI Hospitality shows that revpar across London's hotels increased by about 30% in April, with occupancy rising by about 12 percentage points and room rates increasing by more than 10%.

But room rates in April 2003 had fallen by more than 10%, meaning that hoteliers barely made up the ground lost to last year's exceptional circumstances.

Outside the capital, hoteliers recorded marginal increases in occupancy, room rate and revpar.

Robert Barnard, hotel consultancy services director at PKF, said: "On the surface these figures look very healthy, with positive figures across the board and exceptional leaps in occupancy and rooms yield performances in London.

"But when you dig deeper and compare the results with those for April 2003, then it's clear that room rate is an issue for the whole of the UK, with levels not recovering from the battering they took last year due to the impact of the war on Iraq and the Sars outbreak."

Trading figures April 2004