Know Hospitality Classifications Systems

Classification systems are in place to rate hospitality establishment on services, facilities, value for money, accommodation, cuisine and overall experience. Its purpose is to rank establishments and provide this information to the public. There are six classification systems that are highly recognised, these are: AA, Michelin, RAC, Tourist Board, Egon Ronay and Gault Millau. Although the AA, RAC and the tourist board team up to rate establishments.

Michelin Star

Michelin stars are awarded for food excellence in restaurants. The first Michelin star guide was published in France by Andre Michelin in 1900 and was aimed at motorists that needed to find meals and accommodation in France. Michelin stars are awarded to few restaurants and in 2004 in the UK and Ireland only three restaurants were awarded a three star rating.

Michelin inspectors visit the establishment anonymously and rate them on a three category basis known as Michelin stars. A 3 star rating means ‘Exceptional cuisine worth a special journey’. A 2 star rating means ‘excellent cooking, worth a detour’. A 1 star rating means ‘a very good restaurant in its category’. An additional fourth category ‘Forks and Knifes’ gives a rating to all the other restaurants listed in the Michelin Guide. One fork and knife meaning ‘quite comfortable restaurant’ five fork and knife meaning ‘luxurious restaurant’.

Michelin inspectors rate the restaurant on five different categories: Quality of the products, mastery of flavour and cooking, and the ‘personality’ of the cuisine, value for money and the consistency between visits.

The British Tourist Authority

The English tourist board, AA and the RAC team up to inspect and rate the quality of hotels and rate them on star and diamond ratings. The ratings are then presented by the British tourist authority. The star rating is used with hotels with restaurants and the diamond rating is used to rate accommodation without a restaurant such as small hotels, B&BS and guesthouses.

A one star rating means ‘practical accommodation with a limited range of facilities and service but high standards of cleanliness throughout, it will have a restaurant or eating area. 75% of all rooms will have en-suite or private facilities. On the other end of the scale a five star rating means ‘A spacious, luxurious establishment offering the highest international quality of accommodation, facilities, services and cuisine. There will be a range of extra facilities. Staff will be professional, attentive and provide flawless guest services.

A one Diamond Rating means ‘ Accommodation offering acceptable overall level of quality, offering as a minimum  a full cooked or continental breakfast, other meals where provided will be freshly prepared.’ A four diamond star rating means ‘accommodation offering excellent overall level of quality in all areas, customer care and attention to detail evident in all areas’.

Egon Ronay
Egon Ronay was a Hungarian born food critic, he immigrated to London after World War 2 where he started to manage Princes restaurant in Piccadilly. There he built up contact with The Daily Telegraph where he later wrote a food column. In 1957 he published the first edition of Egon Ronay’s Guide to British Eateries and from then they became very popular making it a mark of distinction to be included in the guide. Restaurants now display blue sign that mentions the year they were mentioned in the guide. They are given a rating from one to five stars on the overall visit to the restaurant.

Egon ronay and his critics would not accept any free meals and would not allow restaurants to advertise in there guides, this ensures the impartiality of the guides. The critics visit the restaurants unannounced to ensure that no ‘special treatment’ is given.

Gault Millau

The guide was founded by two restaurant critics, Henri Gault and Christian Millau. They rates restaurants on a scale from 1 to 20, and this was purely on the quality of food and all comments about the atmosphere and service were separate. Restaurants that were below 10 hardly ever got listed in the guide and while the two critics were the authors of the guides no restaurant was awarded 20 points as the critics believed that perfection was impossible. Gault Millau does not accept payment for listing any restaurant as they believed if they did they would be biased.  

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