The Malta Tourism Authority launched a programme for quality certification yesterday that is aimed at setting basic standards in the hotel industry.
Introducing the programme at a press conference yesterday, outgoing MTA chairman Romwald Lungaro Mifsud said that quality certification is part of a wider initiative to improve the quality of Malta’s tourism product as a whole.
Set up in conjunction with the private sector, the Quality Audit Programme will operate on the basis of cooperation between hotels and four private companies, selected by the MTA after a public call for tenders.
The companies in question are Mejoris, MHCS (Malta Hotel
and Catering Services), PricewaterhouseCoopers and Tuning Fork.
By agreeing to participate in the voluntary programme, individual hotels will be subjected to an audit carried out against payment by one of the above companies. As part of the process, the auditing company will send a mystery guest, selected according to specific criteria drawn up by the MTA, to experience first hand the quality of accommodation and the overall service provided by the hotel. The mystery guest will then report his/her experience back to the company, which will use the information to establish whether the hotel in question meets the necessary criteria for certification.
If successful, the hotel will receive a certificate of quality issued by the auditing company and endorsed by the Malta Tourism Authority. Certified hotels will be able to use the MTA endorsement to advertise their services in a number of ways: by displaying the certificate on its premises, or by incorporating the “approved” logo on advertisements and on websites.
Quality certificates will be valid for a period of 12 months, depending on the initial agreement between the hotel and the auditing company.
Contacted by The Malta Independent, MHCS managing director Anthony Gatt explained the dynamics of the programme in greater detail.
“What the authority has done is to effectively create an environment in which hoteliers have the opportunity to control quality. The programme will help them find out where they are not meeting standards, and will supply them with the information they need to improve their overall product. Given this information, the genuine hotelier will be in a position to identify and tackle any problems which may otherwise lower the standards of service provided.”
Mr Gatt added that, as one of the four companies that met the MTA’s criteria to carry out this work, MHCS’s job will be primarily to convince hotels that it is in their own interest to participate in the programme.
Initially, the Quality Audit Programme will focus only on hotels, guesthouses and other types of tourist accommodation, although it is envisaged that the same idea will ultimately cover all aspects of the prospective tourist’s experience in Malta, including flights and accommodation, guided tours, the standard of service in restaurants and shops, the presentation of historical sites, the state of beaches, public transport and all the relevant aspects of a holiday taken in Malta.
One aspect of this overall upgrading involves the setting up of an MTA customer care freephone number, that will give both tourists and locals the ability to request inform-ation and/or to register complaints about tourism services in Malta. The freephone number, which is operational as of today, is 8007-2330.