Portal Hotelstars Union
The Hotelstars Union was founded in 2009 under the patronage of HOTREC – Hospitality Europe and incporporated as AISBL in 2021.
Austria, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Netherlands, Slovenia, Sweden and Switzerland are Members of the star family. The Hotelstars Union is providing a harmonised hotel classification with common criteria and procedures in the participating countries.
The German Hotel Classification with its five internationally recognised categories provides reliable support in choosing a hotel.
Guests receive an overview of the service and products offered by almost 8,000 classified businesses. Wether one or five stars: all will be awarded to objective criteria, constantly reviewed and modernised.
The classification allows the accomondation establishments a more distict positioning and thus much better sales opportunities.
Domestic and foreign guests demand and chose by reliable criterias, particularly when it comes to houses of the individual hotel industry. Furthermore, the stars are accepted and well-known shorthand messages by guests characterising a hotel's range of services offered. With the use of digital booking systems these shorthand messages even become more important. They are easy to insert into the often short frames of lists and tables which often form the basis of today's decision-making.
The German Hotel Classification knows minimum criteria which place demanding requirements with an increasing number of stars. In addition, corresponding scores are obtainable from the following areas:
It is valid on the principle: the more stars, the more features must be available. You will find an extract of the criteria catalogue here on these sites.
DEHOGA's dividion of the hotel industry determines the obligatory evaluation criteria and terms and ensures their nationally consistent use.
The classification is organised on a volantary basis. Each business decides for itself whether it would like to participate in this process. A resignation is always possible. On the basis of the transparency of the criteria each accommodation business can identify its categorie in advance.
Accommodation establishments exhibiting a hotel character are allowed to participate. All accommodation establishments will be classified within 5 star categories.
Furthermore, there is the designation »Garni« and the affix »Superior« for a more precise distinction. Latter marks the top businesses within a category with clearly score more points than required, but lack minimum criteria of the next higher category.
With the implementation of the classification the state associations of the DEHOGA usually instructed specialised classification companies. In many cases the state associations of the DEHOGA took cooperations with their tourism organisations or the regional Chamber of Industry and Commerce.
The analysis is made via the data entry form which will be filled out by the hotelier. The form will be checked and electronically evaluated. The classification takes place into one of the five internationally recognised stars categories.The classification has a limited validity of three years and has to be repeated regularly. The hotelier receives a representative brass plate for affixing at the outdoor area as well as a certificate of the classification.
Each accommodation business will be visited and controlled strictly. Mostly representatives of the responsible tourism associations as well as of the hospitality industry belong to the commissions to ensure the neutrality of the valuation. An own-awarding of stars via the business itself will be scotched effectively due to the German Hotel Classification.
Under the patronage of 
