Scots voted most generous hosts in the UK

SCOTS are the most welcoming and generous hosts in the UK, a recent survey has determined, with 27 per cent saying they would buy fresh flowers to prepare for the arrival of a house guest, compared to just 18 per cent across the UK.

Scots are better hosts than their rUK counterparts, according to a new survey. Picture: Robert Perry

Similarly, 56 per cent of Scots would stock up on extra breakfast food for any expected visitors, when only 42 per cent of the rest of the UK would do the same.

The survey, carried out by bed and mattress retailer Dreams, quizzed 2,000 UK homeowners aged 18 or over about their hospitality skills and their experiences as a house guest when staying with friends and family.

Some of the findings are both eye-opening and stomach-churning – 36 per cent of participants admitting that they do not change their spare bedsheets before a friend or relative comes to stay.

An overly-polite 28 per cent of people questioned would rather wait until morning than risk waking their host on a night-time trip to the bathroom, while a surprising 8 per cent have never stayed overnight in someone else’s house.

Conversely, almost a third (30 per cent) of respondents aged under 24 have not stayed in a hotel before, preferring to take advantage of their friends’ free hospitality. However, nearly a quarter of people in the same age group complained that their hosts didn’t give out the wifi password during their visits - practically a crime in our technologically-dependent society.

While you might think the answer is to book yourself into a hotel instead, the figures suggest otherwise. One in ten people experienced neck pain after sleeping in an unfamiliar spare bed at a friend’s house, but a much larger 43 per cent admitted to losing sleep due to an uncomfortable hotel mattress.