The MeCo listserv is abuzz right now with an interesting discussion of whether or not Ritz-Carlton should waive a cancellation fee for the AIG incentive to its Half-Moon Bay property the embattled financial company recently pulled.
Some think it would be good PR for the hotel to waive the fee and do its part not to suck up more of the taxpayers' dollars. Others, like me, think it would just be a perpetuation of the bad business practices that got us into this mess to begin with. And I don't think the public really cares to the level that meeting planners do about the minutiae of this whole AIG incentive story--90 percent of what I've read/heard not only got it so wrong at the start, but continues to not understand the difference between an incentive and an executive retreat. Sigh. So as a PR thing, I don't think the hotel would get much mileage from it anyway--definitely not enough to make up the difference--and so should treat it like any other canceled program.