MeetingsNet covered the essential legal knowledge for meeting planners pretty extensively in 2017. From force majeure to food and beverage costs, it pays to know when to compromise and when to walk away from the negotiation.
Here’s a refresher course.
Don’t Skip the Fine Print
Lawyers tell us the rookie mistakes even seasoned negotiators make.
Why Your Conference Needs a Code of Conduct
Today’s sexual harassment headlines underline the need to have a policy in place for when attendees behave badly.
Contract Cross Examination, Part 1: 9 Tough Attrition Questions
A legal expert tackles how to calculate attrition, what elements should be included, and dealing with clients who insist on not including an attrition clause.
Contract Cross Examination, Part 2: What’s In Your Cancellation Clause?
Attorney Tyra Hilliard answers your burning cancellation clause questions, from hotels going hypothetical to the ethics of refusing to add room resale into the contract.
Contract Cross Examination, Part 3: What Falls Under Force Majeure?
Attorney Tyra Hilliard takes on questions about acts of god, acts of politicians, and other potential situations that could make your event “illegal, impossible, or impracticable.”
8 Ways to Negotiate a Fair Attrition Clause Both Sides Can Live With
Attrition can be the bane of a meeting planner’s contractual existence—but it doesn’t have to be.
Penalties Are for Hockey Games, Not Meeting Contracts
What you need to know about the difference between penalties and damages to keep your contract off thin ice and out of the penalty box.
Yes, You Do Need a Cancellation Clause
“If I had a quarter for every time a planner has told me, ‘Oh, we would never cancel a meeting—we don’t need a cancellation clause,’ and then had a cancellation, I’d be rich,” says attorney, speaker, and law professor Tyra Hilliard, Esq., PhD, CMP.
What Planners Need to Know About Cruising Contracts
Industry attorney Joshua Grimes offers some tips that will keep meeting professionals from feeling at sea when they take their groups on a cruise.
Is Your Meeting Illegal, Impossible, or Impracticable?
When is a meeting cancellation not a cancellation? When the situation rises to the level of force majeure. This could be anything from a natural disaster to a terrorist attack to civil unrest—anything that kills the possibility of holding your meeting.
Are These 4 Hotel Sales Practices Costing You Money?
You have your secret strategies to get the most out of every meeting dollar. Hotel sales departments do, too.
Can Your Force Majeure Clause Weather Today’s Storms?
To stay ahead of a weather, civil unrest, or other potential meeting-cancelling situation, your clause should allow you to cancel before your meeting becomes impossible.
Food and Beverage Guarantees: The Other Attrition
Whether you call it a food and beverage guarantee or a minimum, face the facts: it’s really an attrition clause
Watch Out for Urban Fees
You might not be able to negotiate them away—but you can try.
