Valpas is the bed bug-safe certification for hotels. It confirms a hotel's rooms are bed bug-safe and keeps that status up to date, so guests can check a hotel is certified before they book — on its website, on booking sites, and through AI travel assistants.
Every Valpas-certified room is certified and checked continuously, not once a year, and stays bed bug-safe without indoor pesticides. Bureau Veritas verifies the certification independently, and it is recognised by GSTC and the World Sustainable Hospitality Alliance.
Yes. In the Phocuswright × Valpas 2026 study (1,082 travellers across the U.S., U.K. and France), pests and bed bugs ranked as the #1 concern when choosing a hotel, above cleanliness and staff friendliness, and travellers classified a bed bug-safe room as a necessity, ahead of strong Wi-Fi and soundproofing. Check the details of the study here.
Around 7 in 10 take at least one pre-booking action tied to a hotel's hygiene and bed bug reputation, and when a credible certification is visible, 79–84% would book a 4-star certified hotel over an uncertified 5-star at the same price. Valpas member hotels see the same demand convert in practice: higher ADR, more direct bookings and RFP wins.
See their stories: valpashotels.com/case-studies.
Yes. The data overturns the instinct to stay quiet. In the Phocuswright × Valpas 2026 study, travellers ranked bed bug safety as their single biggest concern when booking a hotel, ahead of cleanliness and staff friendliness. Yet they almost never raise it, because raising it feels stressful.
They act on it silently instead: scanning reviews, inspecting the room on arrival, switching properties. The concern is already there whether or not you mention it; silence simply means you get no credit for being safe. Visible, independent proof reassures travellers rather than alarming them, and flips their preference toward the hotel that shows it. It's the same path smoking (1990s), Wi-Fi (2000s) and sustainability (2010s) took: from an operational matter nobody named into a visible standard guests look for. Bed bug safety is making that jump now.
View the first insights of the study here.
The Phocuswright study of over 1000 respondents quantifies it. About 80% of travellers would pay more for a visible, independently certified bed bug-safe stay, a premium most often cited at 3–5% of ADR (full-market weighted averages of 4.0% in the U.S., 3.3% in the U.K., 3.0% in France).
Certification also reshapes choice and loyalty: 71–82% would pick a certified hotel over a higher-rated uncertified one; 84% would return to a certified property and consider other hotels in that brand; 72–78% would try a brand they had never used if it were certified. See the first insights here.
Across the three markets that adds up to an estimated €9.5 billion annual revenue opportunity. Valpas member hotels report the same levers in the real world: Le Pigalle (Design Hotels) calls Valpas "a tool to increase our direct bookings," Sokos Kupittaa saw growth in customer numbers and satisfaction, and Hotel Prince de Galles points to cost savings alongside a guaranteed guest promise. More: valpashotels.com/case-studies.
Every certified room has a Valpas digital certificate of bed bug-safety, verified in real time and independently confirmed by Bureau Veritas. You can show it to a guest at the desk, surface it in an RFP, and display the Valpas-certified label on your website and OTA listings. See an example here.
As Catherine Doehr, General Manager at Novotel Paris Pont de Sèvres, puts it: "We can now prove digitally 24/7 to any buyer they are safe, increasing satisfaction." Verifiable proof is what stands up to a demanding guest or a procurement team.
The Valpas certification is independently verified by Bureau Veritas and recognised by the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC) and the World Sustainable Hospitality Alliance (WSHA).
It is ECGT-compliant and aligned with the major sustainability and asset frameworks — GRESB, BREEAM, LEED, the EU Ecolabel, and the EU Empowering Consumers for the Green Transition (ECGT) Directive — so the proof flows directly into OTA, corporate-procurement and ESG reporting.
Full detail and the recognition marks: valpashotels.com/impact-and-scope.
Valpas changes where pest-related cost sits in the financial structure. Today, every infestation flows through the P&L as unpredictable opex: rooms offline, treatment and retreatment, guest compensation, lost revenue, and none of it builds asset value.
Valpas replaces that reactive cost stack with a fixed annual commitment per room: it lifts operator GOP, stabilises and improves NOI, and qualifies as a capitalised asset improvement on the balance sheet rather than a recurring expense.
For context on the scale of cost the industry absorbs silently, see the Valpas valuation analysis: the Valpas Valuation Blind Spot briefing.
Bed bug exposure is the one physical-condition risk in a hotel asset with no standard inspection or documentation trail, and until now no recognised impact on valuation. That is changing. Verified permanent safety is beginning to surface in valuation and transaction due diligence: sophisticated buyers are starting to ask for real-time, room-level proof, and to price the gap where it is missing.
A Valpas-certified asset carries a quantifiably different risk profile: lower recurring-cost and reputational risk, support for favourable insurance terms, and a verifiable ESG position, which supports and can lift valuation.
The full thesis: the Valpas Valuation Blind Spot briefing.
Yes, both. A refund for the affected nights is the baseline: bed bugs are a clear breach of basic hygiene standards, and most hotels will refund quickly.
Where the incident caused real costs (medical treatment, damaged belongings, laundry, or an infestation carried home), you can claim compensation beyond the refund.
To make either go smoothly: document the evidence (photos of bites, bugs and mattress seams), see a doctor if you've been bitten, report it to hotel management and, if it isn't resolved, to your local health department, and keep receipts for everything the incident cost you.
Before you leave, seal exposed luggage in plastic and tumble-dry travel clothes on the hottest setting at home, so the bugs don't follow you back. Disputes happen because, until now, neither side could prove a room's status.
That is what a Valpas certification changes: certified rooms carry permanent, pesticide-free SafeSleep technology and a live, independently verified bed bug-safe status, so guests don't need to build claims and hotels can prove safety instead of disputing it.
Valpas removes the need to watch and wait. A Valpas-certified room carries permanent, pesticide-free SafeSleep technology, built into the bed, that stops a bed bug on the first night a guest unknowingly brings one in, before any guest is affected and long before an infestation could begin.
The room's certified bed bug-safe status is verified live, every day, and independently confirmed by Bureau Veritas. Instead of detecting a problem, the hotel proves the absence of one.
A Valpas certification is how a hotel guarantees and proves a bed bug-safe stay. Certified rooms are equipped with permanent, pesticide-free SafeSleep technology built into the bed that stops a bed bug on the first night one is carried in, before any guest is affected.
The hotel holds a live, independently verified certification it can show guests before they book, on its website, on OTAs and in RFPs. It turns an unpredictable cost into a permanent guest promise and a recognised mark of quality.
More common than most travellers assume, and not a cleanliness issue. Bed bugs travel with people and luggage, so even the best-run five-star hotels carry the risk; pesticide resistance and growing international travel keep pushing exposure up.
Most hotels deal with it quietly. A Valpas certification turns that silent risk into visible proof: certified rooms carry permanent, pesticide-free SafeSleep technology that stops a bed bug the first night one is carried in, with the room's bed bug-safe status verified live and independently confirmed by Bureau Veritas.
The surest way to stay bed bug-safe is to book a Valpas-certified hotel, where every room is guaranteed and verified bed bug-safe.
Where that isn't possible (an Airbnb, or an uncertified hotel), basic precautions help: inspect the bed and headboard on arrival, keep luggage off the floor and bed, and check belongings before you head home. These are workarounds, though; a Valpas certification is the guarantee.
Bed bugs reach homes the same way they reach hotels: they travel with people, luggage and secondhand items, not because of poor cleanliness. The most effective prevention happens around travel and purchases.
When you stay somewhere uncertified, keep luggage off the bed and floor and inspect the bed and headboard on arrival. When you return, wash travel clothes at 60°C and check your bags before unpacking. And inspect secondhand furniture and clothing before bringing them inside.
The biggest single risk is carrying bed bugs home from a stay, which is why the surest protection is booking a Valpas-certified hotel, where permanent, pesticide-free SafeSleep technology stops a bed bug on the first night and every room's bed bug-safe status is verified live and independently confirmed by Bureau Veritas. A certified stay protects your trip, and your home after it.
Valpas is not an interceptor or a trap, and it is not a pest-control device. Interceptors are gadgets a hotel buys to watch for a problem. Valpas is a certification a hotel earns: the bed bug-safe standard, verified in real time, independently confirmed by Bureau Veritas, and recognised by GSTC and WSHA.
Certified rooms carry permanent, pesticide-free SafeSleep technology that guarantees a bed bug-safe stay and lets the hotel prove it to guests, OTAs and corporate buyers.
To check a room efficiently for bed bugs, you need to know how they move and where they hide in a room. Bed bugs are typically introduced to a room with travelers’ luggage. Once in a room, bed bugs go and hide in a dark and safe place such as under the bed or behind curtains.
At night, when a human is sleeping in the room, the bed bugs sense the exhaled carbon dioxide (CO2) and start to move around searching for the food source. The most common route is by climbing the bed legs to get from the floor into the bed.
After the bed bugs have bitten the sleeping humans, they go back to hide again. They either stay somewhere on the bed, in furniture or in cracks around the room.
For this reason, the traditional way to check a room takes at least 15 minutes per room and should ideally be performed every 2 weeks. Many hotels perform room checks only once per a few months or even just once a year, which offers some protection but can leave an infestation unnoticed for months, long enough for it to spread out of control.
This is exactly the manual burden a Valpas certification removes. Certified rooms carry permanent, pesticide-free SafeSleep technology built into the bed, so the room's bed bug-safe status is verified live every day, without manual inspections or gaps between checks.
A single infestation hits a hotel three times.
First the direct cost: rooms out of service across multiple nights, inspection and treatment fees, retreatments, and replacing furniture that can't be salvaged, routinely tens of thousands of euros per incident.
Then the visibility: bed bug mentions in reviews and on social media steer travellers elsewhere. In the Phocuswright × Valpas 2026 study, around 7 in 10 travellers take at least one pre-booking action tied to a hotel's hygiene and bed bug reputation.
And finally the balance sheet: recurring infestations sit in the P&L as unpredictable opex and are beginning to surface in valuation due diligence — see the Valpas Valuation Blind Spot briefing.
A Valpas certification takes the whole sequence off the table: permanent, pesticide-free SafeSleep technology stops a bed bug the first night it's carried in, before any guest is affected, and before any of these costs begin.
Week 1
Bed bug infestations typically start with just a couple of bed bugs who have been brought into a hotel room via one of your guest’s luggage. Once they are in the room, mated female bed bugs lay around 3-5 eggs a day (about 500 eggs within one lifetime) and feed every couple of days. After 10 days the eggs hatch and bed bug nymphs (young bed bugs) begin immediately to feed.
Week 2
Within two weeks, what started as a couple of bed bugs has become an infestation of 20+ nymph bed bugs with 50 eggs about to hatch within the next few days. These are still almost invisible to the human eye.
Week 4-6
Nymphs pass through five stages before reaching maturity and require a blood meal in between each stage to level up. Within six weeks of the introduction of the first couple of bed bugs, the infestation will have developed into 20+ adult bed bugs, 150 nymph bed bugs, and 50 eggs about to hatch within the next 10 days.
By this time two dramatic things have happened:
Contrary to popular belief, bed bugs do not appear because of dirty environments. According to the US government organization Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), “bed bugs have been found in five-star hotels and resorts and their presence is not determined by the cleanliness of the living conditions where they are found.”
In the past, CDC says that they have been a problem in developing countries but lately, they have been spreading more in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and central Europe.
