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Tourism & Hospitality vocabulary · Guest Relations & Complaints

Escalate

Meaning in tourism & hospitality, with examples

/ˈeskəleɪt/verbCommon term

In tourism & hospitality, escalate means: To pass a problem or complaint to a more senior person or department because it cannot be solved at the first level.

In Turkish: üst kademeye iletmek, üste taşımak, büyümek

How it is used

Front-line staff escalate issues to a supervisor, the duty manager or the general manager. A complaint can also escalate on its own when the guest becomes more upset or takes it further, for example online. The noun is escalation.

Example sentences

  1. If the guest is still unhappy, escalate it to the duty manager.

  2. The complaint escalated quickly because nobody called the guest back.

Common collocations

  • escalate a complaint
  • escalate to a manager
  • escalate an issue
  • escalation procedure
  • complaintA statement from a guest that something is wrong or not good enough, such as noise, a dirty room or slow service.
  • duty managerThe manager in charge of the whole hotel during a shift, especially in the evening and at night, who deals with problems and emergencies.
  • look intoTo find out more about a problem or request so that it can be solved; staff often promise this to a guest.
  • follow upTo contact someone again or check later that a problem has been solved or a request has been completed.

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: Guest Relations & Complaints

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