January 2016 Meeting Recap

January 2016 HSMAI DFW Meeting Recap – Steve Rudner

Outline of Steve Rudner’s Talk

  • Resell Clauses
    • Double dipping
    • It IS ethical, legal, and moral. We are getting what we are owed, we are not double dipping.
    • Repo example – if you just stop paying your car note or mortgage, what do they do? Repo/Foreclose on you and resell the car/house at the same price to someone else.
  • Rebook
    • If they must have, must be based on OUR need time
    • Must be a NEW meeting
    • Of equal or greater size of cancelled booking
    • Within the year
    • Can only use % of cancellation not whole
    • Manhattan example – company cxl on hotel during financial crisis, had rebook, used credit to rebook meeting 3 years out, cancelled early only owing 25% – got off the hook for large amount of cancellation from both
  • Addendums
    • It becomes our burden to review and takes up our
    • How can we stop this?
      • “quoted rates, space, and concessions on available based on the assumption that group uses hotel’s group sales contract ONLY”
      • $500 worth of concessions/staff discounts/ etc. out of contract.
      • If you have an addendum, that will be $500 to review (cost of time, labor, legal fees for attorney to review)
    • If they really need an addendum, tell them these things and likely that they will say “oh actually we only need these 3”
  • Renovation Clause
    • Maui example with engineering log.
    • Not all as simple as they may see – be very cautious
  • Competitors in-house
    • “over your dates we won’t knowingly book any group contracts with your list of competitors, listed here: ABC”
    • ALSO MEANS TRANSIENT GUESTS – Coke VS Pepsi example
    • McDonalds VS Subway aka Dr Association example
  • Ownership change
    • First – Do you even know who owns it now? This should make absolutely no difference
    • Management/Flag change is different
      • Must be careful, if not written correctly management could just mean one F&B manager or ONE sales manager that is no longer working at the hotel
    • Confidentiality
      • This has not been a major problem in the hotel industry, so why waste time and even worry about this? This clause is unnecessary
      • “I’d love to discuss with you what we can do to HELP YOU with YOUR PROBLEM”
        • Shredders in each room at $600/day, Security at each room for $500/each
      • Verbiage should cover you for: “Before company can make claim against the hotel, you must prove you did everything possible to protect your own information” and “we won’t USE your confidential information”
      • Willy Wonka example: what housekeeper/banquet server/etc. wouldn’t take $500,000 from a stranger to get 2 handouts from a competitor in-house and then quit and get another banquet server/housekeeper job?

 

Steve hosts a free audio conference every 3rd Thursday of the month in the afternoon online for hotel sales people exclusively.