Dogs > Disabled: New data reveals pet-friendly holidays outpace accessible stays for families across Europe
Booking a pet-friendly family holiday is approximately 24 times easier than booking a European break with disability access, according to new research released today.
The data, collated by disability holiday specialists World Accessible Holidays, shows there are far more readily available options for a family to go on holiday with their pet than with a wheelchair – leaving families with disability requirements with very limited options.
Whilst approximately 37% of family rooms across ten European countries on booking.com ticked the ‘pet-friendly’ box, only 1.5% offer disability access.
Across the 10 European countries studied, there were 41,576 pet-friendly hotels offering family rooms, with only 1,684 of these family rooms meeting accessibility requirements.
It is substantially harder, and in some countries up to 60 times harder, to find a hotel that caters for disability access needs compared to one that allows families to travel with their pets.
For example, only 0.55% of family hotels offer accessible rooms in Croatia, with only 36 hotels to choose from. However, if the holiday required a pet-friendly room, Croatia offered 2,304 hotels to choose on booking.com.
Paula Hansen, founder of World Accessible Holidays said: “These statistics are disappointing but not surprising. How can it be acceptable for hotels to provide information about accepting pets on a stay and the facilities they can provide for your pooch, yet when it comes to people with wheelchairs, there’s silence? I love my pet, but the fact I know I can take my dog Angus, but not my son who uses a wheelchair and has cerebral palsy, is frankly shocking.”
The 10 European areas analysed included France; mainland Spain; Italy; Greece; The Antalya region in Turkey; Croatia; Portugal; Spain’s Canary Islands; Cyprus and Majorca.
100% of the 10 areas researched generated more hotel options through Expedia.com and Booking.com when searching for a pet-friendly family room than one that has wheelchair access. In addition, information presented by hotels often varied, causing disabled customers confusion about what facilities are available at hotels.
Where hotels who welcome pets had clear wording and policies, there was little consistency in listings of hotels that claim to provide accessibility access, including language like ‘ramp and elevator access’ ‘top floor rooms include lift’ to ‘entire unit wheelchair accessible’.
Portugal presented the highest number of hotels offering disability access across both search engines, with a 2.4% accessibility rate, but the figure is still low compared to 27.8% of hotels offering pet-friendly rooms.
Paula Hansen, founder of World Accessible Holidays, established the business after experiencing this disparity first-hand. Her son, is a wheelchair user and the limited holiday options and stressful booking process instilled the idea for her disability-friendly business.
Paula is striving to make holidays abroad less stressful for disabled individuals travelling with their families and carers, both adults and children. The business launched as a fully transparent booking platform , one which arranges flights and accommodation at high street prices that meets accessibility needs.
She said: “The accessibility market is hugely under-represented and badly serviced. There are a few good specialist operators, but they are very expensive, and out of reach for many disabled families.
“Alternatively, if you try to book with a mainstream operator, it’s virtually impossible to guarantee an accessible room and the booking process is extremely disjointed. Booking platforms rarely list accessible rooms in a clear-cut way or have the option to book an accessible room with equipment.
“We conducted this research to evidence just how far down the priority ladder disabled people are, but I still can’t believe it’s easier to book a hotel for dogs than disabled people. At World Accessible Holidays we are working to change that — because people deserve more options than pets.”
Booking.com’s response: Our aim is to make travel easier and more inclusive for everyone. As part of our efforts to provide people with the accessibility information they need, we have multiple detailed filters on our platform on both a property and a room level. This includes a range of accessibility features, from toilets with grab rails and/or a lowered sink available in the bathroom to the presence of visual aids or auditory guidance at the property.
While we acknowledge that this crucial information needs to be provided by more of our accommodation partners and that there is a long way to go to make travel more accessible for everyone, we are committed to continuing to surface accurate accessibility information so that everyone can find the travel options that are right for them.