A survey has reported large anomalies in the charges that hotels around the world levy for peripheral services.
The survey, which was carried out by Tripadvisor, a website that assists customers in gathering travel information, has revealed that hotels in certain locations around the world will charge considerably more for items such as mini bar purchases, than hotels in other destinations.
One of the largest disparities was between hotels in Moscow, Russia, and those in Cape Town, South Africa, with the former charging as much as four times more than the latter for a packet of mini bar peanuts; GBP7.96 compared to GBP1.20.
In addition to mini bar sundries, the survey also looked at items including room service orders and dry cleaning services, and massive price variations were discovered there too. A club sandwich that costs GBP4.11 in Cape Town was GBP13.95 in Moscow, but hotels in Zurich Switzerland charge even more, at GBP18.67.
Along with Cape Town, Sharm el Sheikh in Egypt and Mumbai in India offered the best value for money, with their prices for a selection of items that included a bottle of water, a can of coke, a mini bottle of vodka and dry cleaning coming in at GBP12.61, GBP15.27 and GBP16.27 respectively. At the other end of the scale, hotels in Moscow, Paris – France, and Stockholm – Sweden were the most expensive for the same items, charging GBP53.05, GBP44.17 and GBP43.97 respectively.
At GBP19.36 for the same list of items, four-star hotels in London were the eleventh most expensive to be surveyed.
Emma Shaw of TripAdvisor was quoted in the Daily Mail, saying, ‘For those willing to shell out a bit more on flights, it seems there is money to be saved in south east Asia or Africa.
‘For Brits looking to stay a little closer to home in Europe, there is a price to pay and that price is on average more than four times as expensive.’
