Corporate Social Responsibility

As a global provider of corporate accommodations, we know that our activities affect the communities and environments we operate in. We therefore seek to ensure that we make a positive difference everywhere that we operate and across all aspects of our business through our policies and practices.
We have adopted, regularly check progress against and review the following rigorous code of conduct together with our citizenship, community engagement and sustainability quality and service frameworks to ensure our impact is advantageous to both our business and the locality.
Through our wider social awareness, the practices we uphold, and the support we offer to charities and schools, we are realising our aim of creating a truly modern and holistic business where commercial gains and local community benefits reinforce each other.

Code of Conduct

Confidentiality

Q Apartments is committed to maintaining the highest degree of integrity in all our dealings with potential, current and past clients, both in terms of normal commercial confidentiality, and the protection of all personal information received in the course of providing the business services concerned. We extend the same standards to all our customers, suppliers and associates.

Ethics

We always conduct our own services honestly and honourably and expect our clients and suppliers to do the same. Our advice, strategic assistance and the methods imparted through our training take proper account of ethical considerations, together with the protection and enhancement of the moral position of our clients and suppliers.

Duty of care

Our actions and advice will always conform to relevant law. We believe that all businesses and organisations, including Q Apartments, should avoid causing any adverse effect on the human rights of people in the organisations we deal with, the local and wider environments, and the well-being of society at large.

Conflict of interest

Q Apartments will not provide a service to a client’s direct competitor unless otherwise directed and advised. We will generally try to avoid any dealings with competitor companies even after the cessation of services to a client.

Contracts

Our contract will usually be in the form of a detailed proposal, including terms and conditions, service-level agreements, costs, timescales and a faithful description of deliverables. The quality of our service and the value of our support are the only true basis for continuity.

Equally, we always try to meet our clients' contractual requirements, particularly in situations where a third-party supplier and/or contractor is engaged to deliver the agreed services, which may require additional negotiations and service delivery controls.

Fees

Our fees are always competitive for what we provide, which is a high-quality, tailored and specialised service. As such we do not generally offer arbitrary discounts; generally a reduction in price is only enabled by reducing the level or extent of services to be delivered. That said, we always try to propose solutions that accommodate our clients' available budgets and timescales. Wherever possible we agree our fees and the basis of charges clearly and in advance. This way, we and our clients can plan reliably for what lies ahead, how it is to be achieved and justified financially.

Payment

We aim to be as responsive as possible in the way we charge for our services. We do not charge interest on late payments, but we do expect payments to be made when agreed.

Intellectual property and moral rights

We retain the moral rights in, and ownership of, all intellectual property that we create unless agreed otherwise in advance with our clients. In return we respect the moral and intellectual copyright vested in our clients' intellectual property.

Quality assurance

We maintain the quality of what we do through continual ongoing review with our clients of all aims, activities, outcomes and the cost-effectiveness of every activity. We encourage regular review meetings, provide regular progress reports and our services are accredited under a number of quality assurance schemes. We shall be happy to provide more details upon request.

Professional conduct

We conduct all of our activities professionally and with integrity. We take great care to be completely objective in our judgement and any recommendations that we give so that issues are never influenced by anything other than the best and proper interests of our clients.

Equality and discrimination

We always strive to be fair and objective in our advice and actions, and we are never influenced in our decisions, actions or recommendations by issues of gender, race, creed, colour, age or disability.
We also understand that different clients have different needs and we are committed to making our accommodation available and accessible to all our guests equally. In the rare instances where this is not possible, e.g. building accessibility for guests with disabilities, we will seek to offer similar suitable alternatives that fully accommodate your needs.
Q Apartments extends the same rigorous high standards and duty of care to its employees and Global Network partners. We shall be happy to provide more details upon request.

Human rights

Q Apartments supports the protection and preservation of human rights, and the fundamental principles of human rights contained within United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

These principles specifically include:

  • The prohibition of child labour
  • The prohibition of forced labour in all its forms
  • Freedom of association and protection from discrimination
  • Discrimination shall include employment decisions based on personal characteristics or beliefs that are unrelated to the ability to do one’s job, including race, colour, gender, gender identity, national origin/ancestry, citizenship, religion, age, maternity, marital status, disability, sexual orientation
  • Working hours: working weeks should not exceed the maximum set by local law
  • Respect in the workplace: employees should be treated with respect and dignity and work in an environment that is free from unlawful discrimination and harassment
  • Compensation should comply with all applicable wage laws, including those relating to minimum wages, overtime hours and legally mandated benefits. Employees should be able to earn fair wages, as determined by applicable local law
  • Working conditions should be adequate and safe and comply with applicable health and safety policies and laws.

Ethical Supply Chain

We work closely with our supply chain network to deliver on Q Apartments’ citizenship, community engagement and sustainability aims.
We encourage suppliers to adopt this code of conduct, while our supplier diversity policy (outlined below) ensures that doing good business pays dividends in quality and service for our clients.

Citizenship and community engagement

At Q Apartments, even though we operate globally we know that we are also part of the local and wider communities we operate in. We seek to maintain a strong corporate social responsibility agenda and work hard to support charitable foundations, particularly those that focus on learning disabilities and disadvantaged children.
In addition to Q Apartments’ support of the ABC Trust (Action for Brazil Children) and their invaluable work supporting some of the most vulnerable individuals in Brazilian society, Q Apartments supports education initiatives in the UK.
We have helped to improve students’ classroom experiences and learning opportunities at Peter Hills, a primary school local to our London office, by donating essential IT equipment and materials.
Our recent focus on developing new and innovative technology also saw us link up with London universities to develop our paid intern programme. We are now able to offer undergraduate students that vital first step to developing their careers.
Our suppliers are also an important link with the communities we work in. We ensure that we operate our business in a responsible manner by being a good neighbour. We pay particular care and attention to minimising noise and light pollution, and creating a positive visual impact in our communities by maintaining building exteriors, outdoor equipment and grounds.
Each initiative and our ongoing overall approach to citizenship, community engagement and corporate social responsibility is driven by our recognition of the social impact our business and others have, and the positive changes we can make to support the communities we are part of.

Supplier diversity

Q Apartments is a global organisation that operates locally. We offer our clients the opportunity to truly experience the diverse communities they work and travel in. We believe that is best achieved as an organisation by being immersed in the culture of the cities we operate in.
Our suppliers are a crucial and integral part of making our clients feel at home as they travel. By using a wide range of businesses that reflect the local environment and communities, we are best able to give our clients the experiences they want.
Our first priority is always to provide our guests with the best experience at the best value while recognising that it is our suppliers that enable us to achieve that aim. Q Apartments’ commitment to using local suppliers where possible not only benefits the local community, but it also builds our business strength and ultimately drives up service standards.
At Q Apartments we therefore aim to procure our goods and services from companies and organisations that reflect the culture, sexual orientation, gender and ethnic composition of the cities we inhabit.
We place no barriers on the size of the organisations that work with us. Rather, we judge our suppliers on their ability to deliver the best quality of product at the best price, with the best service.
With this in mind, we actively encourage Small and Medium-sized enterprises, especially minority-owned businesses, community-based and social enterprises to join our supply chain. We do so because local providers are frequently best placed to improve the business and social fabric of the cities we operate in and in doing so improve our guests’ experience.
The types of goods and services we procure are listed, but are not limited to, these below:

  • Laundry
  • Building repair
  • Contract services
  • Contracted temporary labour
  • Uniforms
  • Food
  • Professional cleaning
  • Valet
  • Print and stationery
  • Maintenance contracting
  • Grounds and landscaping

We understand that our greatest strength is drawn from our collaboration with our suppliers. We celebrate our shared achievements and commitment to excellence while appreciating that this is a process, not an end point.

Sustainability

Q Apartments is keenly aware of our responsibility to minimise the impact of our operations on the environment, conserve valuable resources and prevent pollution. We aspire to be leaders in best environmental practice across all regions.
These activities are underpinned by our commitment to fulfilling ISO 14001 requirements, which include actively promoting recycling, both internally, with service partners and in our serviced accommodation; working with suppliers to encourage best practice awareness of environmental issues; as far as possible purchasing products and services that cause the least damage to the environment; and setting, achieving and working to continuously improve targets through an action plan.
As part of this, we and our partners design efficiency into new buildings, equipment and transport, seek to control and reduce the use of water and certain cleaning chemicals, and dispose of and recycle waste in the most environmentally responsible way.
We also always carry out our activities in accordance with all relevant environmental legislation and have adopted a programme of continual improvement to achieve these aims; please just ask for further information.