Child payment policies an important hotel attributes for
1. Child payment
policies an
important hotel
attribute for
family travelers:
Do Barbadian
hotels need to
pay attention?
Authors: Kelly Hunte and
Antonio Alleyne
2. Introduction
Research has shown that cleanliness, price, quality of
service, location and friendliness of staff were seen as
important hotel attributes to travelers prior to booking a
hotel
Our paper seeks to analyze whether the cost of a
child’s stay and the activities being offered for
children(child payment policies) were important hotel
attributes to family travelers
The paper seeks to determine whether Barbadian
hotels need to pay attention to their child payment
policies (as a marketing tool)
3. Review of the Literature
Dolnicar and Otter (2003) reviewed 21 studies in order to
ascertain the top hotel attributes: friendliness of staff, price,
service quality, location and room cleanliness
Ramanathan & Ramanathan (2011) found that value for money
was also an important parameter
Cadotte and Turgeon (1988) also found that the value offered per
room price was a major attribute in influencing hotel choice
Kazembe et.al (2015) noted that hotels in Zimbabwe did not offer
many services targeted to children and this affected the level of
satisfaction experienced by family travelers
There is no study which one can use to derive general results
about the importance of hotel attributes of the global tourist
(Dolnicar & Otter, 2003)
4. Methodology
This study used a mixture of quantitative and qualitative
methods to reach the conclusions
Desk research was conducted to ascertain the top
family friendly hotels (using reviews as a proxy)
A basic comparative analysis on the activities being
offered by the hotels was undertaken
An online questionnaire which consisted of 19
questions was developed for this research
A critical value of 5% was used, for the Analysis of
variation (ANOVA) test was conducted
p-value= 0.000 < 0.05 = 𝛼
5. Limitations of the study
Low responses to the survey
Access to research papers was restricted due
to limited financial resources
More test could have been carried out
6. ResultsTable 1: Main Activities and services offered by some the top family friendly hotels
Country Hotel name
Dedicated
Care
Profession
als1
Baby-
sitting
servic
es
Theat
re /
Stage
Shows
Water
Activiti
es
Gam
e
Roo
m
Childre
n's gym
Art
s &
cra
ft
Vario
us
Tours
Vario
us
rides
Story
Telli
ng
Movi
e
Nigh
ts
Chil
d
Spa
Tota
ls
Italy
Cavallino Bianco Family Spa Grand
Hotel
1 1 1 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 7
Greece Sani Beach Hotel 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 6
Brazil Hotel Cabeca de Boi 1 1 0 1 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 6
Barbados Bougainvillea Beach Resort 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 1 0 5
Pennsylvania Woodloch Pines Resort 0 0 0 1 1 0 1 1 1 0 0 0 5
Turks and
Caicos
Beaches Turks and Caicos Resort
Villages and Spa
0 0 1 1 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 4
Florida Floridays Resort Orlando 0 0 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 3
Barbados Hilton 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 3
Dubai JA Oasis Beach Tower 0 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 3
Barbados Beach View 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 0 3
Jamaica Beaches Negril Resort and Spa 0 0 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 3
Barbados The Crane 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 1 0 0 3
1
The child care professionals are multilingual
7. Results
The Hunte/Alleyne study found that hotel location
(92.4%); room cleanliness (96.2%), cost of stay (92%)
and friendly and helpful staff (100 %) were important
hotel attributes
Home like characteristics were found to be relatively
insignificant; however, 69.3% stated that general value
added extras were significant hotel attributes
57.7% of the participants stated that they prefer all
inclusive activities
Inclusive meal plans were also found to be important
8. Results
44% of the participants stated that activities and
the provision of a play space for children were
important in their hotel choice decision
Entertainment for the family received a fairly high
score
77.8% of the participants indicated that the cost of
their child’s stay was important when booking a
hotel
96% of the participants had no prior knowledge
that child payment policies existed
9. Conclusion
Cost of a child’s stay is relatively important to
family travelers
Hotels in Barbados who are seeking to penetrate
the family market need to pay attention to their
child payment policies
Bougainvillea Beach Resort, The Hilton and the
Crane need to focus on their child payment
policies and the services they offer to children as
in the authors opinion are best placed to move up
the international family travel market
Editor's Notes
Point 2) This comparison would give a general sense for what type of activities hotels may need to consider when seeking to target the family travel market
Explain the table
We tested 12 attributes: location, activities for kids and play space; home like characteristics; value added extras, all inclusive activities, all inclusive meal plans, swimming pools and water parks, cost of stay cost of your child’s stay
Some examples of value added extras are as follows: free room up grades, free night offers, gift cards, gifts for the children; free spa day etc
The Bougainvillea Beach Resort’s child payment policy would be seen as stringent; however, visitors are required to pay for the provision of most of the services and activities offered by the Resort. The management of Bougainvillea should relook this model as the hotels which received high rankings that have stringent child payment polices offer most their services as part of the price. The Hilton hotel’s child payment policy is fairly flexible, but the number of activities being targeted to children needs to be expanded. The Crane Resort has recently established a kids club and the authors would recommend that the Carne develops a similar model to that which exists at the Cavllino with a Caribbean flare.
