The Rwanda Development Board (RDB) has exposed some weaknesses in the country’s hospitality sector in the latest assessment that the institution made on a number of hospitality establishments. In a survey carried out last month, hospitality experts from RDB visited over 50 hotels and restaurants including 3, 4 and 5 star hotels as well as bars in Kigali for a week. The hospitality establishments were assessed through mystery shopping, targeting areas like staff grooming and professional ethics, guest arrival and welcoming, guest seating and menu presentation, service (order taking, clearing of tables after service and timing), waiter’s/waitresses’ product knowledge, language skills, among others. According to the findings, RDB says there are weaknesses in a number of areas, for instance, in staff grooming and ethics where some staff of the hospitality establishments were observed without uniforms, while others were wearing a mix of uniforms and jeans or just usual clothes. Not wearing name badges and putting on faded uniforms were also among the noted issues, in addition to some unprofessional practices like a tendency of some staff to gather in corners to chat and sometimes forget about serving customers. RDB also noticed issues in guest arriving and welcoming. “In many entities, guests come and never get noticed,” the report read, adding: “A guest sits for a long time (some up to 10 minutes) without any attention from the service personnel.” “In most places none sees you and no welcoming…. No seat offering as there is no staff attending. You will have to raise hands or shout to get someone to attend to you. Smiling is almost a non-existent practice in most visited entities.” The report also claimed that in almost all the entities visited (apart from about 3), no service procedure is followed either in taking orders, serving food and drinks and even clearing of soiled tables. “In majority of visited entities waiters take orders by head – no captain order or notepad to write orders down. In some instances, menus are not even provided. After order taking no waiter ever repeats the order to ensure they are in conformity with the guest order,” the report read. RDB also decried the fact that throughout the service staff are not attentive. “Once they deliver an item (food or drink), they disappear and you have to look around to get someone to assist,” it read. The report also cited issues in the hospitality staff’s product knowledge, where many waiters do not understand the menus. “Even in top hotels, it is hard to get a waiter who can explain the buffet or the menu properly – it seems this knowledge is left to kitchen chefs. Menu knowledge is a big problem,” it read. On a positive noted, RDB says it noticed that language skills among top hotels seem to be good. “You find waiters who are able to speak good English and few trying French as well ü Communication in most middle establishments is in Kinyarwanda and fair English skills,” it noted. RDB recommended more efforts of engagement with hotels owners or managers to understand their role in improving the services. It also recommended strict adherence to SoPs (standard operating procedures), as well as strengthening the enforcement human resources aspects and related regulations in the industry, and intensifying trainings and continue collaborate with partners. It also hinted on the possibility of enacting strong penalties to poor service delivery cases. In an interview with The New Times, Nsengiyumva Barakabuye, the Chairman of the Rwanda Hospitality Association (RHA) said that a number of measures are being taken especially during this month of May to deal with the glaring issues regarding attitudes, skills and customer care among the workers of the hospitality establishments. He noted that they have already identified trainers to help in this regard, and these will offer refresher courses to employees of some hospitality spots, while big hotels (4 and 5 star) will be encouraged to carry out on-duty training of their staff since they are busy. In addition to this, he said hotels have been advised to increase the number of staff to ensure their employees are not overworked, so that they will be effective.
