How to find your chosen accommodation
For a listing of places to stay, showing when accommodation is available, please use the
Hampshire's Countryside website.
Quality assurance
All accommodation listed has been quality assessed, either by VisitBritain or the AA.
The national assessing bodies (VisitBritain* and the AA) now assess hotels and guest accommodation (including B&Bs) to the same criteria and award one to five stars. The star ratings reflect the overall quality of the experience.
When choosing your accommodation look for the
Quality Rose, the official marque of the Enjoy England national tourist board rating scheme.
The Enjoy England professional assessors visit every year, carrying out a routine day visit or an overnight stay in the case of serviced accommodation. On these occasions, they book in as you would, as a normal guest and test all the facilities and services. A quality score is awarded for every aspect of the experience including the comfort of the bed, the quality of the breakfast and dinner and, most importantly, the cleanliness. They also score the warmth of welcome.
For self-catering accommodation, the layout and design of the accommodation and the range and quality of the kitchen equipment is assessed, as well as the quality and comfort of the bedrooms and bathrooms and most importantly, the cleanliness.
For serviced accommodation, there are two separate schemes – one for hotels and one for guest accommodation.
Hotels have to be licensed, offer dinner at least 5 nights a week (unless categorised as a Metro Hotel) and have all rooms en suite or with private bathrooms.
There are different hotel categories including:
Hotel, Small Hotel, Country House Hotel, and Budget Hotel.
Guest accommodation categories are:
Guest Accommodation, Bed and Breakfasts, Guest Houses, Inns, Farmhouses and Restaurants with Rooms. They tend to be personally run by the owners.
Guest Accommodation – Diamonds and Stars
The diamond ratings that were previously awarded to guest accommodation (B&Bs, etc) have been replaced by stars. The new star ratings are designed to meet the greater expectations of consumers with regards to quality and facilities. Higher ratings are therefore more difficult to achieve than under the diamond scheme. You may find, for example guest accommodation that previously held a 4 diamond rating and has been reassessed under the new standards as 3 stars. It does not necessarily mean that their quality standards have dropped.
Hotels have to provide certain additional facilities and services at the higher star levels.
Guest accommodation owners have to provide certain additional facilities and services at the higher star levels.
Gold and Silver awards for Hotels and Guest Accommodation
Silver Awards recognise exceptional quality at all levels and Gold Awards are given to the very 'best of the best'.
If you choose to stay in any of
Enjoy England's quality-assessed accommodation, you can be confident that it has been checked out before you check in.
*
VisitBritain is the national tourism agency, marketing Britain worldwide and England in Britain. Quality is a major element of VisitBritain’s strategy. They assess more than 23,000 accommodation businesses. These assessments are undertaken by Quality in Tourism on VisitBritain’s behalf.
Complaints
If you have any issues with an accommodation establishment that have not been resolved by the proprietor/manager and which you would like to bring to our attention, please write to:
For Enjoy England ratings: For AA ratings:
Quality in Tourism The AA
Farncombe House, 15th Floor Fanum House
Broadway, Basing View
Worcestershire Basingstoke
WR12 7LJ RG21 4EA
Green Tourism Business Scheme
Businesses with a concern for the environment are recognised by the Green Tourism Business Scheme. The businesses' efforts to operate in an environmentally friendly and sustainable way are graded with Bronze, Silver or Gold.