Forbes Standards: Unlocking Excellence and Top Ratings

GoAudits is not affiliated with Forbes Travel Guide or Five Star Travel Corporation. Any references to their rating systems are for informational purposes only and do not imply endorsement or partnership.

In the world of luxury travel and hospitality, a ranking from Forbes Travel Magazine serves as a hallmark of prestige and excellence. Achieving a high rating from this authoritative source can elevate a brand’s reputation, drive customer engagement, and significantly boost business.

However, receiving this stamp of approval is no small feat. It necessitates not only knowing what the stringent Forbes standards entail, but also implementing self-inspections, rigorous training, and performance-based recognition to prepare your team for daily excellence.

In this article, we will provide actionable insights on how you can optimize these processes to elevate your hotel’s standards.

What are the Forbes Standards by the Forbes Travel Guide?

Forbes Standards are a set of guidelines creating a Five-Star rating system for hotels, restaurants, spas, and cruise ships. It is one of the most prestigious and recognized rating systems in the hospitality industry worldwide.

It was introduced by Forbes Travel Guide back in 1958 when it was known as the Mobil Travel Guide. Originally designed as a guidebook for American drivers, it was responsible for creating the first-ever Five-Star rating for hospitality establishments within the United States. 

Currently, the system evaluates standards based on up to 900 objective criteria that measure service, facilities, and quality of guest experience in hotels. Each year, Forbes Travel Guide announces the Star Award Winners list with around 2,000 properties qualifying as 5-star, 4-star, or Recommended.

Receiving a 5-star rating from Forbes Travel Guide is the ultimate recognition for a property, signifying unparalleled luxury and guest satisfaction. Properties that attain this esteemed rating are regarded as some of the best in the world. Being listed among the winners can significantly enhance a property’s standing and attract high-end clientele who are seeking exceptional service and luxury.

How Do Hotels Get Rated By Forbes?

In order to receive a rating, hotels, restaurants, and spas must be visited by an inspector from the official Forbes Travel Guide organization, to undergo a rigorous and independent evaluation process.

The professional inspectors visit hotels anonymously as typical guests, usually for a two-night, three-day stay, but sometimes longer. These mystery inspectors use a list of objective criteria and standards to assess the service, facilities, quality of guest experiences, and emotional experience. 

The standards are generally clear-cut and objective, with an evaluation process involving hundreds of questions that are answerable with a simple Yes or No. The criteria for these guidelines derive from the Five-Star Rating System of Forbes Travel Guide. This rating system evaluates properties with an emphasis on exceptional service: 

• Authentic guest experience
• Evolution of well-being
• Sustainability and luxury
• Demanding guest expectations
• Relaxed luxury

What are Forbes 5 Star Standards of Service?

Forbes Travel Guide teams evaluate hotel service quality and restaurant standards in luxury hotels, restaurants, and spas. Their criteria are updated annually, to reflect an evolving hospitality landscape and continually raising the bar.

3 Influencing Factors for Forbes 5-Star Standards

1. Exceptional & Personalized Service: Does the staff seem to magically know what you want, even before you ask it? Properties that have a 5-star rating offer this kind of exceptional service consistently to their guests. The staff members are attentive, knowledgeable and professional, but also demonstrate intuitive, thoughtful and anticipatory service.
2. Attention to Detail: Properties that have been rated as five-star put a great deal of effort into every aspect of their establishment to ensure that their guests’ experience is flawless. Every detail, from the decoration of the rooms to the design of the public spaces, is carefully planned to create an atmosphere of luxury.
3. Luxurious Amenities: Luxurious amenities are a hallmark of 5-star properties, providing guests with a variety of features to enhance their stay. These amenities include high-quality linens, premium toiletries, cutting-edge technology, and much more.

The 5-Star Rating is about aiming to go above and beyond with hotel standards, engaging with the guests to understand what they are looking for before asking for any help.

To achieve a Five-Star, Four-Star, or Recommended rating, it is necessary to successfully complete the independent inspection process overseen by the Forbes Travel Guide organization. 

Forbes Hotel Standards

Forbes hotel standards include over 900 criteria, evaluating areas such as:

• Interactions Before/at Arrival and Departure: Reservation and Pre-Arrival, Digital Services, Arrival Service, Departure Service. Criteria include items such as interactions over the phone/email/website, staff greetings, and interactions, prompts offering luggage assistance, or reducing the amount of paper used.
• Guest Room and Housekeeping: Criteria to both evaluate the amenities present in the room, and services such as housekeeping and turndown service. Criteria include very specific items, such as number and types of hangers available, or if the bed is remade in a stylish manner.
• Food and Beverage: Hotel Dining, Bar/Lounge Service, and In-Room Dining evaluation areas around staff greeting, interactions, and professional demeanor, proactively taking into account dietary restrictions, anticipating all requirements, food presentation in the restaurant, buffet, and other settings, elimination of single-use plastic and many more.
• Fitness Services and Pool/Beach Service: specific evaluation standards apply to wellness facilities and services. Examples include staff greeting, complimentary refreshments available and proactively offered, swift storage of soiled towels, etc.
• Public Areas and General Guest Experience: Guest Service, Guest Service Request, and Overall Guest Experience criteria include criteria around staff attitude, uniforms and communication across teams.

Forbes Restaurant Standards

Forbes restaurant standards include over 180 criteria that cover areas such as the Reservation Service, Host Service, Dinner Service, Food & Beverage Quality, Facility & Design. Example criteria can include the distinctive design of menus, the accuracy of orders and any particular attentions from the chef, to staff being aware of personal items at the cloakroom.

Not only should the food be fresh, nutritious, and creatively prepared, the meal should generally be memorable. Inspectors are encouraged to think about their meals several days later. If they can easily recall flavors, textures, and feelings associated with the meals and they would be likely to return to the restaurant for that specific meal, the food may be worthy of a five-star rating.

Forbes Spa Standards

From the full Forbes Standards list, hundreds of criteria apply to spas specifically, in areas such as Reservations, Reception Services, Treatment Options, and Public Areas/Locker Rooms.

The standards are constructed to assess the spa experience from the guest’s point of view, with items such as staff graciousness, service personalization, and technological innovation as well.

Forbes Star Rating System: How are Ratings Calculated?

A strict and very structured evaluation process is used to assess thousands of hotels, restaurants, and spas every year. The Forbes organization is clear that Star Ratings cannot be bought by anyone and every evaluation is genuine. Receiving the official Five-Star rating is a prestigious honor and a significant boost to any hospitality business.

Each rating is earned solely through an inspection conducted by anonymous Forbes staff members who answer hundreds of questions with a simple Yes/No. Evaluation questions fall into two key areas: Facilities and Service, with a specific emphasis on Service which accounts for around 70-75% of the rating. All questions are classified into categories, including

• Efficiency
• Technical Execution, Skill & Knowledge
• Graciousness, Thoughtfulness & Sense of Personalized Service
• Courtesy & Manners
• Staff Appearance
• Guest Comfort & Convenience
• Cleanliness & Condition
• Wellness
• Sense of Luxury

Based on the score obtained, this then results in a composite score with the relevant Star Rating:

• Five-Star –  90% and Over: Properties that deliver an outstanding experience and consistently offer a highly customized level of service.
• Four-Star –  82% and Over: Exceptional properties, offering high levels of service and quality of facility to match.
• Recommended – 72% and Over: Excellent properties with consistently good service and facilities.

Additionally, once the stars are achieved, there is a minimum rating requirement that must be maintained over time.

How to Achieve and Maintain 5-Star Ratings? 

An interview with an expert Forbes Travel Guide inspector who has visited over 700 hotels, restaurants, and spas worldwide in Hospitality Net highlighted the advice to achieve top standards: 

• Create a “sense of place” for a memorable experience
• Exceptional management skills, with staff who love their job and go above and beyond
• Anticipating customer’s needs and exciting their expectations with personalized attention to detail
• Prepare thoroughly for the official Forbes inspection in advance, before they even walk through the door.

Indeed, achieving top ratings requires a meticulous preparation. This involves crafting a clear mission statement, developing a comprehensive quality assurance program and standard operating procedures, training staff, and conducting regular internal inspections.

Some properties prepare for external inspections with hotel mystery audits. These audits are usually conducted by external companies, and due to the high cost of this service, only take place once a year or so.

Additionally, many hotel managers are confronted with the question: how to translate hundreds of rating criteria into an accessible format, relevant to each staff member?

Internal checklists and inspections are a great tool achieve top standards and brand compliance on a daily basis. Not only they allow to mirror mystery shopper visits, but also help Management to communicate the relevant standards and train staff.

Benefits of Frequent Internal Audits With Digital Checklists

Integrating a hotel inspection app into your internal QA process can help elevate standards on a daily basis, without too much admin workload. With a user-friendly mobile app, quality audits and operational checks can be performed on the go, with scores and corrective actions visible in real-time.

Here are some of the benefits:

1. Accessible Checklists in Everyone’s Pocket

Standardize your hotel’s standard operating procedures and ensure that everyone is aware of every standard relevant to their area, with frequent inspections and digital checklists in everyone’s pocket. Schedule mandatory self-audits, monitor performance with automated scores and reward high achievers.

2. Efficiency

Paperless, quicker audits and reports, resulting in significant savings in terms of time and resources. Forbes inspectors value sustainability, and it can be incorporated into every aspect of your operations and it’s a great way to show your customers that you care about the environment. 

3. Real-Time Visibility and Performance Analysis

The power of digital audits is in their ability to provide live, accurate insights and aggregated analytics.

With better insights, you’ll gain a dependable method for assessing the effectiveness of your staff’s work, pinpointing areas of improvement, and taking instant action. This will translate into a better guest experience.

With clear automated scores, you can implement a performance-based recognition system for your teams.

4. Communication

Attach photos, annotations, and comments, and share reports instantly. Digital inspections provide a seamless, paperless way to improve communication and collaboration between different teams and departments, resulting in an optimized performance and a better rating.

5. Customization

Tailor digital audits to your organization’s unique needs to ensure that pertinent elements are addressed throughout the inspections.

Ensures that every detail is accounted for during the inspection process, leading to a more precise and efficient analysis of standards implementation. 

Additionally, with a customized checklist, for a given area like Dining, you could simultaneously conduct internal audits for Forbes standards, other external standards like LQA, and also internal brand standards.

Free Hotel Audit Checklists

You can get started with our templates and customize them to the specific needs of your brand: