Hotels in the West Midlands have seen a drop-off in the number of visitors, a snapshot by experts has revealed.

And the revenue per room divided by the total available (Revpar) has also dropped - while in London and the rest of the UK they have increased.

Business advisor TRI Hospitality Consulting surveyed 41 hotels in the West Midlands as part of its study.

And a spokesman for the Hilton Birmingham Metropole at the NEC said "certainly in June we didn't fare as well as we would have liked". She said: "In general the retail position has seen an impact with retail bookings down, perhaps people attending less conferences and there has been less Government business."

And a spokesman for TRI said it was one thing to get the figures in - and another thing to carry out the number crunching to interpret them.

He said: "There can be a number of factors, small and large, which can contribute. The presence of major conferences plays a big part."

The TRI results showed in the West Midlands in the six months up to June, compared to the same period last year, occupancy dropped off by 3.1 per cent to 66.1 per cent. And room Revpar dropped by 3.2 per cent to £43.77.

However room rate - room revenue divided by the number of rooms occupied - was up by 1.4 per cent to £66.25.

TRI took its statistics from a survey of hotels with an average size of 149 bedrooms operating in the three or four star sectors.

A spokesman said all the major players in the region were represented.

TRI said the first six months of this year saw London hotels enjoy a much stronger profit performance than their counterparts in the provinces. London hotels' Revpar grew by five per cent and provincial UK hotels increased by 2.9 per cent.

Director David Bailey said: "After the recovery during 2004, when profits made a double digit percentage increase, the first half of this year has seen a more steady growth in profitability for hotels operating in London."

The differences inside and outside the capital can be seen when it comes to rooms revenue per available room.

"A bigger rise in room sales, typically the key profit driver, within London has helped boost profit there," said Mr Bailey.

Looking forward, London will be affected to an extent by the terrorist attacks and attempted attacks that took place in July.