Their wealth of commercial, financial and well-being benefits is drawing more and more corporates to serviced apartments as their preferred choice of business travel and mobility accommodation; indeed, 73.68% of corporates reported using serviced apartments for business travel in 2023 (GSAIR).
At SilverDoor we know why serviced apartments are the top corporate accommodation choice, but we categorise the reasons under four core principles to make it easy for those who may never have stayed in a serviced apartment to understand the benefits themselves.
1. Safety
| Whether you’re travelling transiently or relocating permanently for work, moving your employees around the world for assignments and projects, or managing business travel, meetings and events programmes, guest safety is critical. For stays of one night, one month or one year, it’s a priority that business travellers feel safe and comfortable in accommodation that feels like home. |
|Property partners who care about your safety as much as we do
Duty of care is key, so SilverDoor serviced apartments are highly vetted in line with the latest legislation and best practice to ensure complete peace of mind.
Before being onboarded and offered to clients, properties must satisfy 150+ mandatory criteria on apartment features, location, and compliance. We use the Dow Jones risk assessment tool to check credibility and all operators must sign our partner terms and conditions mandating compliance with latest legislation and best practice.
Standards are monitored by our Quality Assurance and Compliance Manager and SilverDoor staff regularly view properties in person to check they are safe and suitable for guests. In 2023 alone, SilverDoor people conducted more than 1000 apartment visits, including 500 overnight stays in 64 different cities.
Each visit is logged with a “SilverDoor Verified” report and the property is awarded a quality assurance badge to show it’s been vetted in person by a member of our team. These visit reports consider more qualitative feedback that’s more difficult to capture in our content management system (CMS) on things like shower pressure or noise levels in the surrounding area.
Not only are serviced apartments vetted safely before being onboarded, but they're also the safest option for guests while in house. Serviced apartments are self-contained units: guests can come and go as they please, arrange housekeeping visits according to their preferences, and live fully autonomously in the comfort of top security compliance. This means serviced apartments are a safe choice for all types of corporate guest - single female travellers and families in particular are known to benefit from this peace of mind.
|Quality apartments where you really need them
At SilverDoor, we believe in delivering an unmatched quantity of corporate housing without compromising on quality. We are committed to delivering the widest choice of the best accommodation; offering more than 1 million apartments across 128 countries in our global property network means business travellers can make informed decisions about which apartment to book with the reassurance that every choice is safe and compliant.
2. Savings
Compared to hotels, serviced apartments are more cost effective and deliver more commercial value for businesses. Firstly, with full kitchen facilities and cooking equipment in every apartment, business travellers are less reliant on takeaways and dining out during their stay. Guests can maintain healthy eating habits and reduce expenses while staying in a serviced apartment.
Serviced apartments often have private in-unit laundry facilities or free-to-use communal laundry rooms onsite, so guests don’t need to pay inflated hotel prices for laundry and dry-cleaning services during their stay.
With more value for money per square foot compared to hotels, serviced apartments have more space, better design and quality furniture, and generous storage space, so guests pay less to live more comfortably.
|Cost savings you can’t afford to not make the most of
Aside from these innate cost savings, serviced apartments booked in the UK benefit from VAT reductions for longer bookings. 20% VAT is applied to the first 28 nights of a booking, then from the 29th night onwards VAT is only applied to 20% of the accommodation charge (this is therefore typically levied at 4% VAT for any nights beyond 28 nights).
Booking through SilverDoor also offers specific cost savings and added value. We leverage our partner relationships and large booking volumes to negotiate below the market rate, make savings against client-specific rate caps in their key booking destinations, and negotiate added value in terms of waived fees (for cancellations, early/late check-in/outs, pets, parking, etc) and complimentary addons (like welcome hampers, pet supplies, airport transfers, etc).
The demonstrable cost savings we make for clients demonstrate that not only do serviced apartments improve traveller well-being and promote sustainable travel, but that they do so for a reduced cost.
Ask our account managers how you could benefit
3. Sustainability
Compared to the traditional hotel model, serviced apartments are the most sustainable accommodation option. Serviced apartments are less confined to the mass energy-consuming activities of hotels such as excessive daily laundry as standard, they are self-contained and offer more flexibility for the guest to limit carbon consumption.
Guests can opt for less frequent housekeeping and linen changes, manage their own waste and recycling, and continue whichever other sustainable behaviours they choose as they would in their own home.
|Balancing the need to travel with the need to reduce emissions
Travel is essential to the business travel and corporate mobility industry. We accept that travel, whilst a hugely positive and enriching aspect of our lives, can negatively impact the environment, so we’re committed to minimising this – helping companies balance the need to travel with the need to demonstrate emissions reductions.
Our Carbon Calculator allows operators to enter building-specific sustainability information about their properties, and the algorithm produces an accurate emissions estimate for carbon produced per night. Carbon figures are presented alongside bookable properties on our website and allow guests to make informed booking decisions based on personal and business-level sustainability goals.
Find out more about how the Carbon Calculator works
With sustainability increasingly heavily weighted in procurement and recruitment, opting for the more sustainable corporate housing option is not only good for the planet but also good for the pocket. Talented applicants are often more likely to choose a company with a sustainable travel programme and talented employees are more likely to stay with a company that encourages sustainable travel choices, meaning staff retention is maximised and unnecessary recruitment costs are minimised.
4. Service
For something as personal as business travel accommodation, we believe a human service is vital. But, technology is a critical part of our daily lives and enhances the traveller experience in many ways, so the SilverDoor service is built on a balance between technology and human insight.
|High-tech solutions to client challenges
We invest heavily in our SilverDoor Technology offering and our stack of technology tools is developed in house with direct client and operator feedback in mind. Technology tools we offer as solutions to industry challenges include:
- Our CMS, SilverDoor Connect, makes it simple for our partners to manage their inventory, load live rates and update their compliance credentials.
- Our online booking tool (OBT), found on silverdoor.com, empowers clients to manage their accommodation programme, receive high-level reporting and track programme performance.
- The SilverDoor Carbon Calculator uses property-specific information entered by operators into our CMS to generate a calculated estimate of the carbon emissions produced per night of stay in their apartments.
- The SilverDoor API presents serviced apartment content next to hotel options on our clients’ own platforms and allows bookers to directly compare rates, facilities and carbon emissions.
Our global team of experts use these tech tools to complement the personal service they provide to clients.
Register your interest in our OBT
|High-touch service driven by instinct and empathy
We use our experience, first-hand product knowledge and market insight to make recommendations for our clients based on empathy and instinct. Our teams can assess the nuance of individual booking scenarios and harness our technology to successfully fulfil client requirements.
The SilverDoor service means ringing us at any time of day or night and getting through to a real person within three rings. With seven offices across every global region, our multilingual teams are there to support guests from enquiry to check-out and beyond. Our dedicated Guest Services team are focused on ensuring ultimate guest satisfaction, and work with our property partners to resolve any issues quickly and efficiently.
The 4Ss are how we categorise the core benefits of serviced apartments, but the list is endless. Reach out to our Business Development team if you’re interested in learning more about how to maximise the full potential of serviced apartments for your business or if you want to start incorporating serviced apartments into your programme.
