Failte Ireland Service Excellence Award

Published: Thursday 24th October 2019

PRESS: Galway Hospitality Group is best in class for customer service.

The Connacht Hospitality Group has recently achieved the Failte Ireland Service Excellence Award across all of its properties and is the only hospitality group in Galway to boast this accolade. In order to achieve the “Fáilte Ireland’s Accredited Service Excellence Award” a business must demonstrate that a minimum of 75% of the management and staff have completed the Fáilte Ireland Service Excellence Programme.

The Connacht Hospitality Group is a Galway based family owned business, comprising of three hotels, The Connacht Hotel, which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year, the Forster Court Hotel, and a 20-bedroom boutique style hotel called Residence Hotel located on Quay street.  Also included in the group are three licence premises, the award- winning An Pucan, Bar 1520 located in the Heart of the Latin quarter and the popular HYDE Bar & Gin Parlour on Forster street and a 24-Hour Gym and leisure centre called Active fitness. 

In the ever-competitive world of the Irish tourism industry top class customer service is now more important than ever. Ireland is not seen as a low-cost destination, yet Ireland needs to compete with equal product at a lower cost. The opportunities for “points of difference” are slim. One key opportunity which must be taken and advocated for is “the provision of best in class service experiences” the outcomes of which will benefit the visitor, the business and Ireland Inc.

We are delighted that the Connacht Hospitality Group has achieved the Fáilte Ireland Service Excellence Award which is a great testament to the staff, management and teams of the Hotels, Bars, Restaurants & Fitness businesses across the group”. The Service Excellence Programme is making a real difference on the ground, not only to visitors and their overall experience, but also to staff and management who can see real value in going the extra mile, in not only meeting but exceeding the expectations of our visitors. The Service Excellence Programme is a very valuable tool for any business, it sets the business apart and establishes a position as best in class in terms of excellence in customer care, and ensuring that the customer journey from start to finish is as good as it can be. Our thanks to Mairead and the Wild Atlantic Way team in Galway for their commitment to driving the national Service Excellence initiative forward, and our congratulations to the Connacht Hospitality Group on this great achievement in being awarded the Fáilte Ireland Service Excellence Award”.

Martina Kerr Bromley
Fáilte Irelands Head of Operations, Enterprise, Food & Hospitality

“We are delighted to have received the Failte Ireland Service Excellence Award for our properties. This is an excellent initiative from Failte Ireland supporting front line customer service teams. The feedback from our teams on the training provided was very positive and the training was delivered in a very professional and pragmatic way that allowed the team to practically apply their learnings in their day to day roles. As a company we are very appreciative of the training support received from Failte Ireland. We are proud to employ over 400 staff in the city and we pride ourselves on our passion for taking care of our team and who then in turn, take care of our customers.”

Wayne Neilon
Group General Manager, Connacht Hospitality Group