195 / 462
GAZETTE
april
1991
Admission and Refusal Law in Hotels
- The Appearance of Customers
Introduction
A hotel has an obvious interest in not refusing to admit and serve
a person because it is denying itself an opportunity to make money
and because it might obtain a bad name in the locality as a result
of the refusal. Nonetheless, it is a relatively common occurrence
for hotels to refuse to admit and serve various types of persons and
it seems that the higher the grade of hotel the greater the incidence
of refusals. The wide variety of possible reasons for hotel refusals
will be considered later.
There are, in fact, significant
legal restrictions on a hotel's
freedom to refuse to admit and
serve customers, but quite often
the hotel is not aware of what
these legal restrictions are, or, if it
is aware, then it often acts as
though it is not. In making such
refusals as it wishes, the hotel can
usually rely on the customer's
ignorance of the hotel's legal
obligations and, correspondingly, of
his own legal rights. Just how
confidently the hotel can rely on
the customer's ignorance of his
rights is borne out by the fact
that nowadays legal actions
against hotels for wrongful refusal
to admit and serve are almost
unknown.
It is extraordinary that this state
of affairs should exist because
customer, or consumer, rights of
service in hotels are one of the
oldest forms of consumer
protection known to the law. In an
era where there has never beena
greater emphasis on the rights of
consumers, it is doubly remarkable
that the existence of such of a
consumer right should be quite
unknown. The Director of
Consumer Affairs and Fair Trade -
who is the state official charged
with responsibility for consumer
" . . . nowadays legal actions
against hotels for wrongful
refusal to admit and serve are
almost unknown."
matters - has not made any
efforts to date to remedy this
situation although it is clear that
in S 6 (g) of the Consumer
Information Act 1978 he possesses
the power to do so. He could, for
instance, under this statutory
provision, launch a public
information
and
education
programme to inform the public of
its rights under s.3 (1) of the Hotel
Proprietors Act 1963. Nor is the
by
Mark McDonald,
Lecturer in Law,
Dublin College
of Catering
Director the only statutory person
who is economical wi th his
statutory powers. There is another
statutory body - Bord Failte -
which also posses the power to
inform hotel users of their rights.
Section 8 of the Tourist Traffic Act
1983 empowers Bord Failte to
require a hotel to display in the
interior of the hotel such
information as the Bord requires,
and under another provision - s.44
of the Tourist Traffic Act 1939 -
the Bord is empowered to supply
external signs to hotels containing
such information as it prescribes.
Each of these powers could be
used by Board Failte to oblige hotels
to inform customers about theirs
and the hotel's respective rights of
admission and refusal.
Since both the Director of
Consumer Affairs and Fair Trade
and Bord Failte are statutory bodies
concerned with the protection of
consumer's interests, albeit in
different ways, it is striking that
between them neither appears
interested in informing the hotel
customer of his rights.
While there is not the awareness
of the law that there should be, that
law still exists and applies, and
there is a considerable amount
which may be said about it. In
the remainder of this short article,
it is proposed to concentrate on
one aspect of the issue - the
refusal by a hotel to admit a person
because of his appearance. The
other two broad categories of
hotel refusal, relating to the
facilities of the hotel or the
behaviour of the guest will not be
examined.
The Legality of Refusals on the
Grounds of Appearance
Section 3(1) of the Hotel Proprietors
Act 1963 sets out the legal
obligations of hotels as regards
admission and refusals. It states:
"The proprietor of a hotel is
under a duty to receive at the hotel
as guests all persons who, whether
or not under special contract,
present themselves and require
sleeping accommodation, food or
drink and to provide them there-
with, unless he has reasonable
grounds of refusal".
If a refusal made under this
section is unreasonable the
proprietor leaves himself open to
both civil and criminal actions in the
District Court.
Mark McDonald
177