Meeting News - September 8, 2008 - (Page 123)

Live from the Forum @ MeetingNews.com TOPIC: Room block rate undercut by hotel rate W ith the down economy everyone is feeling the pinch. We have a room block with Do you have a burning question to a hotel with a rate of $319 a night. Now, a year later the economy is tanking, and ask your peers? Log on to the the hotel is offering special “summer rates” at $229 per night. Nothing could have preMeetingNews Forum to get answers pared us for this, since we signed the contract well before. This hotel is in peak season fast. meetingnews.com/forum and must have a bunch of empty rooms. If I was an attendee I wouldn’t book within the block. Is there anything we can do to mitigate the loss? Has anyone put something in their contracts that if a hotel undercuts the room rate, then the new room rate will apply? Amy Sherwood, Events Director, International Association of Privacy Professionals, York, ME Amy, I think one of the things that may cover you is a clause in your contract that allows you to review the room pickup report of the hotel to compare your registered attendee list to that of the hotel’s room reservations. Anyone that is booked in the hotel that is a registered guest of your group should be credited to your room pickup. Not sure if the hotel will allow you to do this at this point, but it is pretty tough since they are undercutting you by $90/night. Ask if they are willing to either lower your room rate or give you credit for your attendees that book outside of your block. Eli Gorin, Owner, gMeetings, Inc., Aventura, FL Sorry to be a contrarian, but this subject is a real pet peeve of mine. Imagine that your group locks in a contract rate two years out. By the time the meeting date approaches, hotel demand has surged and the economy is booming so that your contracted rate is way below market. I have never heard of a group in such a situation demanding that the hotel raise its rate to match the market. Instead, the group pats itself on the back for having made a good deal and for having locked in rates. Just as no hotel would ever come to a group in such a situation and ask for a higher rate, no group should ask the hotel for a lower rate. When parties contract years in advance, they are all gambling. Sometimes we win and sometimes we lose, but neither circumstance should change the deal we made. Steve Rudner, Esq., Rudner Law Ofﬁces, Dallas Steve makes a good point. And, I come from the country of “it never hurts to ask” and in full recognition that the hotel has no obligation to lower your rate because, as Steve said, you agreed to the deal when you negotiated it. And you need to stand by your word. What Steve didn’t address is how to handle the resulting performance and/or commission issues resulting from however many people seize the opportunity to book at the much better rate. Here, I’m with Eli. If the business walks in the hotel door because of your event, then you should be credited for however many room nights they stay. The hotel has every right to decide on the room rates they think they need for their own rev- enue management. If, however, their actions undercut your ability to perform your agreement, then they need to step up to the plate and take responsibility to the extent that they count all the nights of everyone in your group, whether ofﬁcially in the block or not. Rae Baskin, President, ConferenceWorks! Inc., Whitestown, IN Steve, of course you are right in every eye except the customer. When attendees book around blocks, the meeting planner loses credibility— regardless of the circumstances. At the bottom of this issue is that Americans equate volume purchases with discounted prices. When the attendee hears of a single room being purchased for two-thirds of what he paid for the same room in a large block, he’s not interested in learning the ﬁner points of yield management. He may well think that there’s a kickback someplace. The organization questions the meeting planner. The meeting planner questions the hotel. I do have the right to sell my rooms for whatever price I think they’ll fetch. Agreed-upon prices are just those—agreed upon. If that planner doesn’t book me in the future because of the angst I caused, I lose money. Is it worth the risk? Tom Blackman, Director of Sales and Marketing Seascape Beach Resort, Monterey, CA Contract law looks down on one party impeding the other from fulﬁlling their end of the contract. If the hotel undercuts me on a large amount of rooms (not talking 10 or 20), and my entire groups decides to book outside the block, then the hotel has impeded my ability to fulﬁll my contractual obligations. This recently happened to me in Las Vegas. A very large group that was supposed to be in house at the same time as mine canceled their contract, and the hotel was looking at a massive amount of empty rooms. So, they cut their rate, advertised it on their website, sent e-mails out about it to their mailing lists, etc. Did I get them to honor the rate for my group? You bet. Everyone in my group will be getting the new discounted rate (which is $60 a night below my room block rate). Kathleen Horton, CMP, Durham, NC MEETING NEWS (ISSN 0145-630X, USPS No.356-010, September 8 2008, Vol. 32, No. 15 is published semi-monthly except for June, August, November and December, which is monthly, by Nielsen Business Media, 770 Broadway, New York, NY 10003-9595, tel. 646-654-5000. Subscriptions are offered free of charge to individuals actively engaged in planning meetings or conventions in the U.S. and Canada. The cost of a subscription to non-qualiﬁed subscribers is $79 in the U.S. and $95 in Canada (Canada Post Publications Mail Agreement No. 40031729). The cost of a foreign subscription, payable in U.S. dollars, is $195. Periodicals postage paid at New York, NY and additional mailing ofﬁces. MeetingNews is a trademark owned exclusively by Nielsen Business Media. Copyright © 2008 by Nielsen Business Media Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction of this magazine, in whole or in part, is prohibited unless authorized by the publisher. For address changes (please include mailing label), single copy sales ($10 per issue including shipping and handling, prepayment required), subscription information, and other customer service inquiries, write to MEETING NEWS, P.O. Box 1189, Skokie, IL 60076-8189 or call 847-763-9050. Printed in the USA. POSTMASTER: Send changes of address to MEETING NEWS, P.O. Box 1189, Skokie, IL 60076-8189. www.meetingnews.com September 8, 2008 MeetingNews 123 http://groups.google.com/group/MiForum http://meetingnews.com/forum http://www.meetingnews.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Meeting News - September 8, 2008

Meeting News - September 8, 2008 Contents Letters to the Editor What's Up @ MeetingNews.com Social Scene People Making News Hotels & Resorts Convention Centers CVBs International Green Beat Insider Report: Golf Destination Insider MN Webcast Report Advertisers Index Live from the Forum Mexico Hawaii

Meeting News - September 8, 2008

For optimal viewing of this digital publication, please enable JavaScript and then refresh the page. If you would like to try to load the digital publication without using Flash Player detection, please click here.