International Guest Service
Welcoming, advising and selling to guests who don’t speak the local language, with the same confidence the team has with everyone else.
- Price
- From €275 per person
- Duration
- Agreed with the hotel
With international guests, revenue slips away in small moments. An email enquiry answered in the local language, or the next day. A dish of the day nobody can explain, so nobody orders it. A better room nobody offers at the desk, because the words don’t come. A complaint half understood, which turns into a review in German. This programme works on those moments with the English the team already has: the phrases that matter at reception, in the restaurant and on the phone, and what guests from the hotel’s own markets expect. The work runs on the situations of the shift, one person at a time, not on grammar.
The outcome
By preparing the phrases the desk and the restaurant actually need, knowing what guests from each market expect, and replying in their language before and after the stay, participants welcome international guests with confidence, and the hotel sees it in foreign-language reviews and in enquiries that turn into bookings.
Targeted Groups
This programme is designed for:
- Receptionists and night porters
- Restaurant and bar staff
- Concierge and guest relations
- Reservations, for email and phone
- Seasonal staff, before opening
- Whoever replies to reviews
Course Objectives
By the end of the programme, participants will be able to:
- Run check-in and check-out in English without searching for words
- Explain the menu, the dish of the day and the wine list to guests who don’t speak the local language
- Offer a better room, a table or an excursion in English, in one sentence
- Understand a complaint in another language in full before answering
- Know what guests from the hotel’s markets expect: times, breakfast, payment, the way they complain
- Answer email enquiries in the guest’s language within the day
- Reply to reviews in the language the guest wrote them in
- Recognise when a colleague or machine translation is needed, and use them without losing the guest
Targeted Competencies
Participants will develop the following competencies:
- Check-in and check-out in English
- The menu explained in English
- The one-sentence offer, in English
- Listening to a complaint in another language
- The habits of the hotel’s markets
- Writing a reply to an enquiry or a review in the guest’s language
- Using machine translation and checking it
Unit 01
The international guest, from search to review
- The five moments where a booking from abroad is won or lost
- What the guest reads before booking, and in which language
- Why a reply in the local language to an email in German is close to no reply
- Which countries your guests come from, and in what share
Unit 02
At reception: arrival, stay and departure
- Check-in in English, sentence by sentence
- Describing the hotel and the area to someone who doesn’t know them
- The offer at the desk, in English
- The bill and the city tax explained without misunderstandings
Unit 03
In the restaurant and at the bar
- Explaining the menu and the dish of the day
- Allergies and dietary requests in another language
- Suggesting wine and dessert in English
- Mealtimes and table habits of different markets
Unit 04
When something goes wrong
- Hearing out a complaint in another language
- The phrases that calm and the ones that irritate
- What to promise and what not to
- When to call a colleague or the manager
Unit 05
Before arrival and after departure
- Answering an email enquiry in the guest’s language within the day
- Using machine translation and checking it before sending
- Replying to a review in a foreign language
- What to measure ninety days later
You'll see it in your own numbers
- The share of bookings that come from abroad
- Foreign-language email enquiries that turn into bookings
- What international guests spend beyond the room, in the restaurant and at the bar
We measure this
- The score of reviews written in foreign languages on Booking.com, Google and TripAdvisor, with the twelve-month trend
- How many foreign-language reviews get a reply, and how fast
- Floor observations with international guests, scored before and after the programme
What it won't fix:
It is not a language course: the work uses the English the team already has. And on its own it does not bring bookings from abroad, which also depend on how the hotel presents itself online: that is Profit Performance work.
Every DolceVita programme is individual and tailored: one participant at a time, online or at your property, in live service. Content, pace and case material are calibrated to the competencies and the role of whoever is being trained.
From €275 per person
This is the starting price. The final one depends on how many people we train, the time it takes and what your hotel needs.