Zest Leisure

Thrilled staff at Bedale and Stokesley Leisure Centres are celebrating achieving ‘Excellent’ in their recent Quest Assessment, putting them amongst an elite set of leisure facilities nationally.

The two leisure centres join Northallerton Leisure Centre and Thirsk & Sowerby Leisure Centre who also achieved an ‘Excellent’ rating in their most recent Quest assessments.

Quest is commissioned by Sport England to assess the quality of leisure centres through a rigorous inspection programme that includes all aspects of leisure centre operations.

The assessments were carried out in April at Bedale and Stokesley, after the leisure centres reopened their doors following the easing of government COVID restrictions. The two-day assessment focused on COVID safety with both leisure centres achieving an overall rating of ‘Excellent’, excelling in the areas of cleanliness and hygiene, operational management, programming and customer journey. Both staff and customers are consulted during the assessment process and a mystery visit on centre activities is carried out to measure the consistency of service standards.

Councillor Paula Thompson, Portfolio Holder for Leisure said: “We have a continuous improvement programme for the benefit of our customers, and Quest is a great way to demonstrate our commitment and achievements.

It is great news that Bedale and Stokesley Leisure Centres have been awarded an ‘Excellent’ Quest rating, demonstrating the hard work of staff to welcome customers back after lockdown, and the leisure centres efforts overall to improve people’s health and wellbeing, at such a crucial time.

We know that some people may be cautious about returning to activities that they enjoyed before the pandemic, but hope that the results of these independent audits will provide even greater reassurance regarding the cleanliness and hygiene at the sites and the COVID-19 measures in place.”

All Hambleton District Council centres have now maintained an ‘Excellent’ rating over the last four years.  It means that the four district run facilities are in the top 10% of leisure centres nationwide.

• Quest is the UK Quality Scheme for Sport and Leisure established in 1996. It is a tool for continuous improvement, designed primarily for the management of leisure facilities and leisure development. Quest defines industry standards and good practice and encourages ongoing development and delivery within a customer focused management framework. For more information, visit www.questnbs.org