5. However we are buoyed somewhat by a strong intake for May and signs of good trading for the Summer and Autumn.

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1 CEO REPORT MARCH Summary 1. After a strong end to trading in , we have had a more challenging start to , with the winter weather and the early Easter both working against us. We hope to catch up as trading picks up over the late spring and summer. 2. There is good momentum with many of the projects in this year s Operating Plan. In this month s bumper edition I have taken the opportunity to give a flavour of some of the work underway on impact, fundraising, volunteering, customer engagement, the new website, GDPR and communications, to name but a few! Trading, financial and operating performance 3. It has been a challenging period for trading over March and April. We anticipated a strong last minute intake for the end of March, with Easter falling into the end of the month this year. This late intake was coming in strongly until the weather turned against us. The unprecedented levels of snowfall and storm disruption generated an impact of around 5,000 overnights. March ended up with more overnights than the previous year, but fell 3% and 5% behind our budget for volume and revenue respectively. 4. As we anticipated April is also proving to be a challenging month. The poor weather in the first part of the month suppressed demand and we are also comparing unfavourably (with no bank holidays in the month this year) to a peak period last year (Easter 2017 being on April 17th). 5. However we are buoyed somewhat by a strong intake for May and signs of good trading for the Summer and Autumn. 6. We have just completed the sign off meeting with the auditors and the final financial figures for 2017/18 will be circulated this week. They show an improved position above the forecast included in January s budget submission as trading in February was above expectations (in contrast to March and April, as noted above). 7. Whilst the new food provision has been well received, F&B had a tough month with fewer groups than budget and last year, inevitably reducing overall revenues. 8. With April trading tough (as noted above), whilst preliminary figures for March are showing cost savings offsetting the income shortfalls (to make the bottom line broadly in balance), we expect to be behind at the end of April offsetting some of the additional gains from final 2017/18 performance.

2 Guest satisfaction 9. ReviewPro (3rd party bookings booking.com, TripAdvisor etc.) started the year on a positive with scores for March % ahead of last year. All categories, service, value, location, cleanliness and room were positive against last year. YHA Treyarnon Bay hit the top spot with YHA Malham, Hartington, Ilam and Conwy in the top five. 10. By contrast, there has been a slight decline in the TLF scores (from our own questionnaires) see below. Historically ReviewPro and TLF (customers booking via YHA website) have shown similar trends so the team are looking closely at this. Recent changes to the survey questions and number of questions have encouraged a significantly higher TLF response rate. Over 3,000 people responded in Match against circa 2,000 last year which makes March 2018 the most responses in any month since TLF started with YHA. London remains a challenge and further actions are taking place to focus on improvement in this region including improvements to wifi, and the customer visible in-house maintenance regimes. 11. ReviewPro summary:

3 12. TLF summary:

4 Capital projects 13. At London Stratford I am pleased to say that the building on site has now been completely demolished, and site investigations are scheduled for the start of May. We continue to receive updates on ongoing investment in and around the Olympic Park, the latest being the announcement that the operators of Madison Square Gardens have purchased the land to the rear of the YHA site and they plan to develop an 18,000 seat arena. An update on progress with London Stratford, was reviewed by PAC in April and will be discussed at the May Board meeting. 14. On other projects, the refurbishment of the first phase of YHA Bath has been completed to time and budget. A soft opening event was held on 12 th April, which I was able to join with my family after returning from a few days holiday. The hostel was looking great with the new reception bar opening up the social spaces within the beautiful listed building. Work continues with the development of the new annex which we plan to open for November. We are keeping under review the open date until the hostel foundations are completed and we are out of the ground. 15. Finally, the refurbishment at YHA Perranporth is on track for completion on Friday 27 th April and open to guests from 4 th May.

5 16. On YHA Oxford, to inform our ongoing negotiations, YHA s surveyors are providing further advice on the rental values of the new hostel and freehold value of the existing YHA. Separately, Jake Chalmers, Property Director, is meeting with Network Rail in May to review progress with the masterplan. 17. Peter Gaines (Chair), Margaret Hart (Vice Chair), Jake Chalmers and I are meeting with the Chair and CEO of Snowdonia National Park Authority on 3 rd May to discuss our plans for investment in Snowdonia and seek to gain their support. Events and partnerships 18. I have updated the plan with the latest position. Date Event Attending 19 December - Postponed on the day due to urgent Parliamentary business still to be re-arranged Peak District hostel tour with Ruth George MP for the High Peak May 2018 Meeting with LD health spokesperson Norman Lamb MP on our new charitable focus 2-4 May 2018 Snowdonia hostels tour, meeting with National Park and Facebook Live 10am on 4 May from YHA Pen-y-Pass May 2018 British and Irish / European hostelling conference, Brussels (postponed from March) Margaret and James attending We are still liaising with her office to agree a suitable date Peter and James to attend Date still to be confirmed meeting will now take place in Parliament we are continuing to liaise with his office Peter/Margaret/James Margaret and Joe attending June 2018 exact date still to be confirmed but must be by end of June Closed APPG AGM with John Mann MP, possibly other APPG officers 3 rd July 2018 YHA Swanage re-opening event 15 th July 2018 YHA St Paul s 50 th anniversary celebration being led by Tom Levitt, ex Labour MP for High Peak and former staff member at St Paul s James/Peter will be invited; Sam Littlechilds (as APPG administrator) attending All Board members welcome Informal gathering of former staff contact Sam Littlechilds for further information 20th August 2018 Tour of Peaks hostels with Peter and James to attend Patrick McLoughlin Winter 2018 YHA Bath re-opening event Date to be confirmed

6 19. The main focus over the last month has been internal communications and the twice yearly business updates more on that below. Other meetings since the last briefing have included: our volunteer archivist John Martin in early April. John has kept on top of the YHA archives for many years, and is over half way through a multi year project to develop profiles on every hostel something highly valued by our hostel teams and marketing and communications departments; the NCVO Annual Conference and dinner, hosted by Sir Stuart Etherington. It was a useful day, primarily to swap notes with other charity Chief Execs, and we also heard from Baroness Tina Stowell, the newly (and controversially) appointed head of the Charity Commission. Her speech, focusing on the Commission s role in upholding the current public interest on charities following the Oxfam affair, got a mixed reaction from the audience, but emphasised the continued importance of openness and transparency in reporting. Jack Buckner, CEO of British Swimming (and previously CEO of British Triathlon). Jack is interested in exploring closer links between YHA And British Swimming. We will meet later in the year to discuss further. Impact 20. The latest year to date slide on our impact is below note that we are reporting just one month s figures as we start the new financial year.

7 21. In August last year the Purbeck Young Carers group visited YHA Perranporth and benefitted from financial support from YHA. At the time YHA filmed them (available on YHA TV), carried out interviews with them and we also asked them to complete a short quantitative survey to capture their wellbeing at the start and the end of the residential. This showed that all of them lived in deprived parts of Dorset and all had caring responsibilities for someone in their close family. Across all three measures of life satisfaction that were used there was a significant improvement for the young carers between the beginning and end of their residential trip. In March 2018 the group were invited back to the soft opening at YHA Swanage and the opportunity was taken to do a follow-up with them. Analysis of these results is ongoing but explores what s changed for the young people over the past six months and their wellbeing now. 22. Case studies are also underway with Hendon School (who take part in work experience opportunities in the London hostels), DASH (recently settled families) from Huddersfield, traineeships and a group of volunteers from Autism East Midlands. 23. Plans to introduce a survey for young people to complete on arrival and on leaving any/all of our YHA-delivered trips/programmes are progressing well. This will enable YHA to gather data consistently on outcomes for young people across our three areas of focus life skills, physical and mental health. The survey will be piloted in 2018 at Edale and Castleton and reviewed at the end of the year prior to extending it to other hostels.

8 24. We now have a full year s data from our guest satisfaction surveys which shows that being in and around our hostels and nature, can make positive contributions to health, help people recover from pre-existing stresses or problems and support concentration and clarity of thinking. 25. For example, 69% of our staying guests reported gains in their personal sense of health and wellbeing. The figure increases by 10% for those guests who stayed in our countryside hostels. 26. More on this data in future reports. Communications 27. YHA featured on the World at One on Radio 4 on 3 rd April. Duncan Simpson, YHA s historian and ex Head of Communications, talked to the show about YHA in relation to the original 1939 Penguin Guide on the Lake District. At the time the guide was produced YHAs Borrowdale, Black Sail, Eskdale, Keswick and Windermere were all operating and feature in the guide. Duncan was interviewed at YHA Borrowdale, and was a great advocate for YHA. 28. It has also been a strong month for coverage in the national press, with YHA featured several times in the Mail and Guardian. The detail is in the separate PR report that has been circulated separately to the Board. Internal communications 29. We re at the time of year when we recruit the majority of our seasonal colleagues into our hostels to support us through our busy summer season. This sees us taking on some 400+ new team members, many returning, along with those joining YHA for the first time. This month we have produced some new videos for new starters, including a brand new Team Member Video Handbook which features colleagues from Peaks and Central and from London and supports a more detailed Team Member Handbook, and an updated Welcome to YHA film, presented by me. All will form part of new starters information, as well as being available on the intranet and on our #RewardMe employee benefits site. 30. March and April also saw a busy schedule of Spring Exec Business Updates for me and the rest of the Exec team these are bi-annual all-team briefings which take place in every region and in National Office. We presented a review of 2017/18 s highlights and performance and looked ahead to the priorities for the coming year. We also launched our mental health campaign, by signing the Time to Change employer pledge to commit to tackling mental health stigma and discrimination and to improve the way we think and act about mental health at work. We have developed an action plan, setting out how we will be doing this,

9 which includes workshops and employee champions. There has been a very enthusiastic reaction to this from staff teams, as there has been to our work to prioritise and sharpen our charitable focus and refresh our commitment to the environment. 31. Following the Board s decision to put aside 100k within the 2018/19 financial year to fund business opportunity projects across the network, we launched this fund, and the process by which staff can submit their ideas, at these Exec Business Updates. Ideas will be logged and reviewed by the Finance team before being submitted to the Exec Team for consideration at our meeting on 22/23 May. Customer engagement 32. On Friday last week we sent out The Wanderer our members e-newsletter - to our members with a newly designed footer. This is a significant step which now provides access to a new preference centre and a link to our privacy policy. In addition to the existing unsubscribe link, the preference centre and privacy policy link support, the ongoing GDPR (data protection) project ensures we are really clear how we are using our customers addresses, including the option for them to suggest their preferred content in communications and of course the option to unsubscribe altogether. 33. Beyond just using the footer, in future we will be encouraging our customers to amend their preferences at various stages in their customer journey with YHA. Moving forward, all data segments will be created using information from the preference centre in the first instance, along with other insight we have based on historical campaign engagement. 34. The preference centre really helps from a GDPR compliance point of view but we expect to see a reduction in the number of people unsubscribing from all communications. The really exciting element is the ability to take our segmentation to a new level and further increase our engagement. Website 35. Development of the new YHA website platform has progressed well. Soft launch of the site commenced 23rd April as planned. To protect online trading performance and minimise any reputational risk from teething problems, only a small percentage of users of the old site were invited to try the new site (via an onscreen pop-up message). Early indications are positive. People using the new site (between 5% - 10% of all F&I website users) appear to be experiencing no major issues, and we re seeing healthy booking conversion rates comparable to

10 the existing site. Our teams continue to monitor, analyse and review all data available and will move towards a full launch to 100% of users early May. 36. The new site will launch with several features disabled such as user login, membership purchases, saving card details to minimise risk and allow for a smooth migration path. These features will be reintroduced to the website with a phased approach during May. We expect to see some disruption to traffic and bookings during the full launch of the site early May, as search engines (e.g. Google) re-cache our site. However, a great deal of planning and technical effort has been put into minimising the scale and impact of this disruption. Communities 37. Implementation of the Voluntary Income Strategy agreed by the Board has got off to a good start. At the end of 2017/18 the Communities Team had generated 1.39m (accrued and banked income) in total; achieving a 157% increase on , albeit helped by some significant legacies towards the end of the year. For every 1 invested into voluntary income generation, the team returned 6. Breaks programmes supported 8,000 young people during Over 160 families applied for the new family breaks programmes. 211k of additional voluntary income was raised to support our capital investment strategies. 38. Early indications for 2018/19 are encouraging. In March the Communities team generated 76k, 18k ahead of last year s position. 39. The 2018 London Marathon event saw a team of 11 inspired and motivated runners raising 20k for YHA. I joined staff and cheer squad volunteers who were supporting our runners and their friends and families at YHA Thameside, Embankment and meeting them as they crossed the line. Amongst the runners were two hostel managers, Penny Ellis of YHA Coalport, and Yvonne Barber of YHA National Forest, who raised 5K. The 2019 recruitment cycle began week commencing 23rd April. 40. Earlier in the month YHA Black Sail celebrated its 85 th birthday in the company of the Chapman family whose parents (Harry and Joan) were long time volunteer managers from the 1930s, and Jack, their great grandson unveiled a plaque in their memory. 41. Development of our corporate partnerships has continued. Early tests have generated support from Next, Diggerland, Scrap a Car and KPMG.

11 42. During the first quarter, further work will be undertake to assess and pilot, simple, engaging and cost effective methods for customers to give during their stay in support of our work with young people. Operations and People 43. A number of hostel manager appointments were made at YHA Liverpool (Sean Rogers), YHA Dartmoor (John Glasper) and YHA Medway (Sharon (Ronnie) Cottrell). Cal Wyman (currently Deputy Manager at St Pancras) was promoted to Hostel Manager (maternity cover) at YHA Earl s Court. Appointment is imminent for a new manager at YHA Oxford. 44. The recruitment process for the new Director has begun, with a recruitment agency due to be selected early next week. 45. The 2018 YHA Awards will take place on the 1st May at YHA Cardiff to celebrate our people in both National Office and the YHA Network. 120 staff members are attending, with 17 categories ranging from Financial Performance to Volunteer Engagement. Volunteering 46. The volunteering team are currently recruiting for this year s summer camp volunteers. There are two roles available volunteer team leader and welfare volunteers. There are 54 week-long opportunities for team leaders to fill and 7 week-long opportunities for welfare volunteers. The process is going well with more applications than places, but we will over-recruit because there is always drop off. 47. The Volunteer Partnerships Manager, Jamie Wakefield, has been prioritising universities to target summer camp recruitment and has been attending events on campus, giving talks and identifying opportunities for universities to help us promote YHA volunteering with them. In March he visited University of Coventry, Sheffield University, Manchester Metropolitan University and Leeds Beckett University and 14 universities have agreed to continue with promoting our opportunities after Easter to their students. Whilst visiting campuses, time has been taken to explore whether there are opportunities to connect with specific departments around placements, as several universities are starting to require students to complete 120 hour voluntary placements as part of their course in their second year. To date we are well placed to work with University of Derby and Leeds Beckett University on placements and we anticipate that we will be hosting students on these placements in late 2018 onwards. This work is all feeding into our Partnerships project, about which there is a paper coming to the May Board.

12 GDPR 48. The ICO (Information Commissioner) has recently published a GDPR assessment tool to help organisations identify their readiness for the new legislation against the core principles. YHA s progress has been run through the tool and our overall rating is green, subject to seven actions that are in progress. There will be some lower-level actions that will be ongoing throughout 2018 but these are low risk and we have a plan to deal with them. Additionally, we are now working on the development of a GDPR Governance Framework to ensure YHA remains actively compliant beyond GDPR coming in to force on the 25th May. And finally 49. We know the power that small amounts of investment can make to the performance and perception of hostels and to the motivation of the staff team hence the Springboard programme and the surplus surplus recommendations. 50. I thought I d finish this month s report with an we received in the Exec this week from Sue, the manager at YHA Hawkshead in the Lake District, who I visited in September at the end of a tough season dealing with large NCS groups, staffing shortages and a hostel in desperate need of some investment in critical areas: I wanted [to share] the feedback we re enjoying at the start of this season at Hawkshead, thanks largely to the investment made over the winter. The turnaround, not just in the guest reviews, but also in the morale and attitude of the returning staff is nothing short of remarkable. I thought it was important to share with you the huge impact investment has made at this hostel. Of course there are still some tired and dated facilities here, but because we have some real Wow factor rooms now our staff have much more pride and purpose in their work, and guests are appreciating it and telling us so. Thank you!