This award is designed to recognise and reward providers of services such as meals, sea crossings, event tickets and accommodation. We were looking for those suppliers who have made outstanding efforts to accommodate, attract, and welcome coaches, their drivers and their passengers.

Winners: Encore Tickets

Encore was established in 2000 as a specialist ticketing company for the travel industry and group organisers. Now the largest independent ticket wholesaler in the UK, Encore sells in excess of 1 million theatre tickets annually.

This is Encore’s second successive win, and once again the judges were very impressed by specialist services for operators, such as the money back guarantee scheme and the split coach offering that allows operators to book multiple shows for one performance date, offering greater choice and a better chance of full loads.

Runners Up:  P&O Ferries

Europe's largest ferry operator, P&O has a wide range of cross-channel routes, including Dover-Calais, Portsmouth-Bilbao, Hull-Rotterdam and Hull-Zeebrugge. Additionally, P&O Irish Sea operates between Liverpool and Dublin and from Cairnryan and Troon to Larne. Group and coach bookings are a major part of the company's business, and it offers easy booking facilities and flexibility.

The judges were particularly impressed by P&O's web site, which was fast and flexible with good on-line booking facilities for account holders and offering dedicated group booking pages one click from home page.

Highly Commended

The following organisations were also nominated by coach operators from around the country, and were highly commended by the judges.

• Action Tours Shifnal Shropshire
• Leisure Breaks Limited, Epping, Essex
• Warner Leisure Hotels, Hertfordshire
• Wightlink – Isle of Wight Ferries Portsmouth

Who could be nominated?

This category was open to:

• ferry operators
• river cruise companies
• hotels
• restaurants
• heritage railways
• theatres and concert halls.
• producers of theatrical events and other special events.

… and by whom

Readers of Coach and Bus Week magazine who are coach operators were asked to nominate providers of services they have admired during the last 12 months.

They were asked to explain why they think the nominated service provider deserves this award – this will cover such matters as:

• the ease of booking 
• the flexibility and quality of customer service during the enquiry and booking stages
• the welcome provided on the ground to
  • the coach
  • the passengers
  • the driver