The directors of the Company, as for all UK companies, must act in accordance with a set of general duties. These duties are detailed in section 172 of the UK Companies Act 2006 which is summarised as follows:
‘A director of a company must act in the way they consider, in good faith, would be most likely to promote the success of the company for the benefit of its stakeholders as a whole and, in doing so have regard (amongst other matters) to:
- The likely consequences of any decisions in the long-term;
- The interests of the company’s employees;
- The need to foster the company’s business relationships with suppliers, customers and others;
- The impact of the company’s operations on the community and environment;
- The desirability of the company maintaining a reputation for high standards of business conduct; and
- The need to act fairly as between stakeholders of the company’.
As part of their induction, a director is briefed on their duties and they can access professional advice on these, either from the Company Secretary, or from relevant officers of the global parent undertaking (see note 28) or, if they judge it necessary, from an independent adviser. The duties of the directors are partly fulfilled through a governance framework that delegates day-to-day decision-making to employees of the company, especially those with responsibility over the business activities in which the group operates.
We are committed to compliance with the spirit of the UK Corporate Governance Code (the ‘Code’), although generally the Code is adopted by UK listed companies operating for profit and which pay dividends to shareholders. Despite this difference, the directors are of the view that, generally, the principles of good governance as set out in the Code apply to the company and group.
The following paragraphs summarise how a director fulfils those duties:
Risk Management
We provide resort-based holiday experiences and relaxation-critical services to our owners and guests, often in health and safety regulated environments that continue to evolve. As a result, our business and our risk environment has become more complex. It is therefore vital that we effectively identify, evaluate, manage and mitigate the risks we face, and that we continue to adapt our approach to risk management.
We consider safety to be an essential feature in the successful running of the business and our aim is always set on creating a safe workplace with safe working practices. We are committed to providing high standards of health and safety practice and will ensure so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare of all employees whilst at work; this responsibility extends out to guests, visitors, contractors and members of the public, to protect against risks to health and safety arising out of the business operations.
For discussion of our financial risks and uncertainties, please see the strategic report.
Our People
We are committed to being a responsible business. Through the Hilton Grand Vacations (‘HGV’) Brand Pillars, our vision is to inspire people to go further and share more. Our mission is to ensure that by putting people first we commit to ensuring employees become family, guests become owners, and owners become the heart of everything we do. Our HILTON values (Hospitality, Integrity, Leadership, Teamwork, Ownership & Now) are the core of our operation. Our behaviour is aligned with the expectations of our people, members, ultimate investors, communities and society as a whole. People are at the heart of our holiday and resort-related services.
For our business to succeed we need to manage our people’s performance and develop and bring through talent while ensuring we operate as efficiently as possible. We must also ensure we share common values that inform and guide our behaviour so we achieve our goals in the right way.
Through our ultimate parent undertaking, HGV, we champion a number of people initiatives within our UK, EU, and Global operations. We work with external operators to provide an apprentice framework, ensuring the development and upskilling of our staff and resulting in a range of business qualifications. Employee recognition programmes, such as the Champions Club Award and Sparks, enable us to recognise and celebrate talent and achievement from our various geographical regions and at varying levels of seniority, across the business, career longevity and tenure is celebrated through our anniversary award scheme.
We operate an Employee Assistance Programme. This service provides an online forum to encourage our people to be aware of their own physical and mental wellbeing, as well as offering more specific counselling and telephone advice services across a range of topics.
The overall wellbeing of our employees is important to us. Given the spread of our geographical locations, interpersonal connections are encouraged both virtually, through social media forums, and physically. We have developed structured schemes such as ‘Connect and Celebrate’ within our Resort Operations, and hold Social Events across the year. We also provide a staff getaway programme, enabling employees to stay at a Diamond owned Resort at a reduced and fixed rate, along with access to the global ‘Go Hilton’ programme for eligible staff.
Employees have access to a variety of team member resource groups (TMRG’s) which have been purposefully created to put people first by embracing diverse voices to foster a culture of inclusion and belonging at HGV. These groups highlight, champion, and provide discussion forums for topics such as PRIDE, Women’s Day, Diverse Abilities, Sustainability, Parents and Care Givers, and Young Professionals.
Business Relationships
Our strategy prioritises owner retention and the organic growth of our resort rental offering, driven by up-selling services and club memberships to existing members and bringing new guests into group owned or managed resort destinations. To do this, we need to develop and maintain strong relationships. We value all of our suppliers and have mutually beneficial contracts with our key suppliers.
Within the organisation, there have been many actions to support a closer and improved relationship with suppliers across all the business units, such as: Improving and refining supplier management information systems; Introducing dedicated managers for resort rental agencies and partners; Entering long term agreements with key suppliers; Introducing regular business reviews with key suppliers; and Formation of a dedicated department for corporate and resort management spending to make procurement more effective and efficient, with the aim of ensuring that the quality of the brand is maintained across all resort destinations and at the right price.
Sales centres are located at key resort locations across Europe. Members will be invited to attend an update meeting while staying at the resort, which is optional. Members who choose to attend the meetings will receive a personal update on their membership including help with any issues they are experiencing. Members will also have the opportunity to enhance their membership if requested.
The sales function in Europe is predominantly operated by two sales agencies. The agencies operate from locations in Spain, the Canary Islands, and the UK. The Director of Sales Operations for Europe manages that relationship and is responsible for product promotion, legislative compliance and customer service. The sales agencies exclusively promote Diamond European Collection points. The sales agencies are registered with the Financial Conduct Authority to broker consumer credit using Diamond’s consumer credit brokerage licence.
All sales agencies operate to a prescribed code of conduct and receive compliance training from the business on all aspects of the sales operation including the brokerage of consumer credit. Consumer contracts and credit agreements are processed by a contracts team based in Lancaster, England, which is entirely staffed by group employees. This team is also responsible for the independent verification of the product sale and any linked consumer credit. The team also provide after sales service to purchasing members.
Day to day servicing of members needs are attended to by the customer service team that operates 24/7 globally. Members can access assistance by email, key social media channels and by telephone.
We operate ‘Destination Xchange’, a global exchange program for timeshare owners at group-managed resorts. Destination Xchange enables owners and members to ‘swap’ their timeshare usage rights for alternative holiday accommodation made available through the program.
Community and Environment
Our approach is to use our position of strength to create positive change for the people and communities with which we interact. We want to leverage our expertise and enable colleagues to support the communities around us.
The business recognises the importance of reducing its impact on the environment and has implemented community initiatives to facilitate improvement and towards sustainable development. At our European resorts we have eliminated the majority of single-use plastic items and in the UK our resorts are ISO 14001 certified (effective environmental management system).
We have in place, and continue to develop, a simple set of operational standards in the form of a sustainability commitment with measureable values, which takes care to minimise impact whilst ensuring the guest experience is not compromised. In the coming years, it is our intention to adopt a more coordinated approach to ensuring a sustainable future.
Stakeholders (including Members of holiday ownership and resort timeshare clubs)
The directors are committed to openly engaging with the stakeholders of the company. As an organisation, we recognise the importance of a continuing effective dialogue, whether with our parent undertaking (see note 28), resort-based commercial partners or with the membership that we service. It is important to us that stakeholders understand our strategy and objectives, so these must be explained clearly, feedback listened to and any issues or questions raised and then properly considered.
We send regular emails to the membership base on a variety of topics, including but not limited to: New member benefits, changes to member benefits, changes to processes, amendments to rules of the club, pre-arrival emails for resort bookings, mid-stay feedback emails and post-stay surveys asking for feedback.
Members can contact us via social media and we have a dedicated team who handle this channel. In addition, we have a dedicated page accessible through the Diamond Resorts’ member sign-in on hiltongrandvacations.com called ‘what’s new’ in which we post important advisory news relating to the membership.
We send out owner’s club AGM notices via email and give members an opportunity to ask any questions should they be unable to attend AGM in person. These questions are answered as appropriate and content posted to the Diamond Resorts’ member area (hiltongrandvacations.com).
Finally, we provide each club member with a full directory of membership, or online access to such. This document contains detailed information on how the club and membership works, including but not limited to: contact information, how to manage points ownership, make reservations, exchange points, access member benefits & offers, check-in at resorts, access the club community and also a full listing of the points values at the portfolio of Diamond resort destinations.