travel
Premier accessibility
When is an accessible Premier Inn not an accessible
Premier Inn?
Answer: When you phone and talk to staff at Poole North about accessible rooms.
I don’t normally question the accessibility of rooms in these types of places. However, having stayed at so many either for short breaks, work or visiting family, I know that no two are the same.
Sometimes it is a subtle difference or a difference that determines my personal level of access (like not needing to take so much disability equipment if I can transfer to the loo on one particular side).
Something made me query the sink (in which I would be washing hair and so on) as to whether it was built into a wall, built into a unit or was free standing to get underneath and up close from my wheelchair.
My husband called first and the person on the desk said they were built in... followed by ‘oh no, I don’t think so in the disabled rooms’. The moment the person gave me reason to doubt, prompted a second phone call the next day for a second opinion. This person also didn’t fill me with confidence.
Staff couldn’t provide a photo of the bathroom which would have cleared up the query once and for all so I had to enlist my brother, who was in that area this week, to visit and take a look himself (and take some photos). Of course, it was good of staff to let him do that but what would have been much easier is to see a picture of the rooms and layout. A cheap and easy solution that would have meant minimum inconvenience for all concerned and increased their standard of customer care.
Just having ‘accessible rooms’ is really not enough because different layouts pose different barriers for different people and a picture could really help resolve a customer’s query.
I believe photographs of accessible rooms, holiday cottages etc should be a minimum part of any disability standard because disabled people don’t always fit the ’accessibility standard’ box.
Answer: When you phone and talk to staff at Poole North about accessible rooms.
I don’t normally question the accessibility of rooms in these types of places. However, having stayed at so many either for short breaks, work or visiting family, I know that no two are the same.
Sometimes it is a subtle difference or a difference that determines my personal level of access (like not needing to take so much disability equipment if I can transfer to the loo on one particular side).
Something made me query the sink (in which I would be washing hair and so on) as to whether it was built into a wall, built into a unit or was free standing to get underneath and up close from my wheelchair.
My husband called first and the person on the desk said they were built in... followed by ‘oh no, I don’t think so in the disabled rooms’. The moment the person gave me reason to doubt, prompted a second phone call the next day for a second opinion. This person also didn’t fill me with confidence.
Staff couldn’t provide a photo of the bathroom which would have cleared up the query once and for all so I had to enlist my brother, who was in that area this week, to visit and take a look himself (and take some photos). Of course, it was good of staff to let him do that but what would have been much easier is to see a picture of the rooms and layout. A cheap and easy solution that would have meant minimum inconvenience for all concerned and increased their standard of customer care.
Just having ‘accessible rooms’ is really not enough because different layouts pose different barriers for different people and a picture could really help resolve a customer’s query.
I believe photographs of accessible rooms, holiday cottages etc should be a minimum part of any disability standard because disabled people don’t always fit the ’accessibility standard’ box.
