Hotels

Workers and Guests Have Different Language Needs in a Hotel:

1.  Some Workers Say Little to Guests: housekeepers, gardeners, maintenance, shuttle drivers.

• These need a few words to be polite and answer simple questions from guests, "Where is...," "When is..."  They need Numbers, Time, Hotel Lesson 1, and oral practice or songs.

2.  Guests who stay in a hotel which does not know the guest's language: for example Brazilians in Russia, India or China

• These need Hotel Guest Lesson and Hotel Lesson 1 to arrive, enjoy themselves, and leave. They need Numbers and Time to understand answers to their questions. Then they need oral practice or songs. Guests can book reservations in their own language, since they can use translated email, a website, or an agency. They have guidebooks in their own languages explaining specialized terms like suite or king size.  

3.  Some Workers Have Detailed Conversations with guests: front desk, telephone, concierge.

• These need to understand a range of sentences on checking in, money, rooms, complaints, and getting around the area. They would benefit from all the lessons here. They especially need Numbers, Time, Alphabet (for spelling names), Telephone, Hotel 1 and Hotel 2.  "[M]ost of the utterances are short, direct and purpose-driven. They rarely consist of more than one clause, and ... are mostly based on or influenced by what guests say. Such responses are, for the most part, strictly functional." ("Hospitality language as a professional skill" 2003p.80) Then they need oral practice or songs.
• The front desk and concierge also need a translator App on a tablet (Apple, Android or Windows). They will use it when a guest goes beyond the worker's language abilities. The App needs to display alternate keyboards to let the guest type in the guest's own language and alphabet, which the App will translate to the hotel worker, and it will translate the worker's answers. Voice translation is a good feature, but typing will also be needed when the App misunderstands a voice.

4.  Restaurant Waiters    Click for Restaurant Lesson

• Waiters need to understand special requests and common questions, which are taught here. Waiters also need to speak and understand the entire menu, which varies and cannot be taught here. The restaurant can translate the menu with Google or Bing into common languages of the guests, and the guests will feel more welcome. Waiters also need oral practice or songs.

5.  Foreign managers who supervise local workers

• These need intermediate skills in the local language. They can use the best courses in the List of Language Courses and oral practice or songs.

Groups 1-4 need to speak in very simple words, because many people they talk to have limited English vocabulary (think of desk clerks in Russia or China talking in English to guests from Indonesia or Arabia).
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Click for comparison of 35 courses in hotel English. Most cover a difficult mixture of  the topics above. So it is hard for each group to learn what they need. Websites and books often start with making a reservation or booking by phone. Booking by phone is very hard and rarely needed: people can use translation sites on the internet.

Hotels and Travelers: Top 16 Countries

Travelers come from everywhere and go everywhere. They need people who speak their language.

FOREIGN TRIPS (Overnight, most recent year available in 2008-2012)

876,000,000     World Total, by Origin of Traveler:
  85,000,000      Hong Kong, China
  83,000,000      China
  72,000,000      Germany
  58,000,000      United States
  57,000,000      Britain
  44,000,000      Russia
  32,000,000      Canada
  29,000,000      Italy
  26,000,000      France
  21,000,000      Ukraine
  19,000,000      Netherlands
  19,000,000      Saudi Arabia
  18,000,000      Japan (all trips; most are overnight)
  16,000,000      Mexico
  16,000,000      Sweden
  15,000,000      India

There are 876 million overnight tourist trips per year (UNWTO Factbook, Outbound table 3.2). Numbers include trips between Hong Kong and the rest of China.

Most of these travelers use hotels and need help in their own languages. 

ROOMS IN HOTELS  (2011-2012)

Rooms          Average Rooms Per Hotel
21,170,000         41     World Total
   4,900,000        93     United States
   1,500,000      132     China 
   1,370,000        27     Japan 
   1,100,000        32     Italy 
      950,000        27     Germany 
      900,000        47     Spain 
      660,000        37     Mexico 
      650,000        17     Britain
      620,000        36     France 
      530,000        NA     Thailand 
      410,000        25     Indonesia 
      400,000        41     Greece 
      400,000        40     Brazil 
      330,000      117     Turkey 
      290,000        22     Austria 
      260,000        33     Russia
 
There are 21 million rooms (UNWTO Factbook,  Accommodation  tables 4.13-4.14). Numbers include motels, guest houses, vacation rentals and hostels.

Many hotels are small (average 41 rooms), so they need the simplest possible training for their workers.

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