{"id":542,"date":"2012-04-23T15:48:11","date_gmt":"2012-04-23T15:48:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hotel-lobbyists.com\/blog\/?p=542"},"modified":"2012-04-23T15:48:11","modified_gmt":"2012-04-23T15:48:11","slug":"one-more-scandal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hotel-lobbyists.com\/index.php\/2012\/04\/23\/one-more-scandal\/","title":{"rendered":"One More Scandal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft  wp-image-543\" title=\"news-clipart\" alt=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/hotel-lobbyists.com\/hl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/news-clipart-300x271.jpg\" \/>It was one thing when the $16 Muffin scandal was uncovered because it was mostly unfounded and a gross exaggeration of the truth to make a political point.\u00a0 It still had terribly undesirable consequences but once the flaws in the reporting were revealed, all that remained was some pretty disastrous public relations and the all too common feeling of having to defend our existence as meeting planners and travel professionals once again.\u00a0 Then came the GSA scandal, which was exponentially more damaging.<!--more-->Damaging more so because the findings of unethical behavior may have a more factual basis than did the case of the $16 Muffin.\u00a0 The ultimate consequences of this investigation are yet unknown, but it has already had lightning quick, knee jerk results in terms of cancelled government meetings all over the nation and grossly complicated new approval procedures which make planning a meeting all but impossible.\u00a0 In the end, this may prove to have truly catastrophic effects.\u00a0 It may wind up being a singular moment in our industry\u2019s history \u2013 be prepared for people to colloquially term these eras as pre-GSA and post-GSA.<\/p>\n<p>And how ugly a time it is.\u00a0 And all for what?\u00a0 Meetings have proved necessary time and time again.\u00a0 The actions of a few, ruining life for a great many has also proved to be the way of government.\u00a0 I have a client who actually said to me, \u201cWe are hoping that we won\u2019t have this meeting next year.\u201d\u00a0 We can\u2019t have people hoping meetings don\u2019t happen.\u00a0 Meetings are not only a vital engine of the fragile economy, an industry on which so many Americans rely, but it will forever be a necessary medium for people to do business with other people.\u00a0 People don\u2019t do business with teleconference screens.\u00a0 We can\u2019t let the GSA scandal alter the way we as humans interact with one another professionally.<\/p>\n<p>As peripheries to the industry \u2013 site selectors \u2013 we stand to lose an awful lot should the government leap to the conclusion that the use of firms like ours harms taxpayers.\u00a0 Our services are entirely free to the government and we save the government time and money. We make no illusions about our compensation \u2013 we are paid by the hotels.\u00a0 In that way, we are neither in contract with the government, nor do we affect the pricing in any regard.\u00a0 Hotels do not account for commission as a discount in room rate.\u00a0 Commissions are an expense, a cost of doing business.\u00a0 This can be easily proved \u2013 the per diem rate is the per diem rate.\u00a0 Rates are not raised in order to accommodate commissions and hotels will go to lengths to document this on the contract.\u00a0 Leveling our industry because of perception \u2013 in this case misperception \u2013 would be a travesty.<\/p>\n<p>In the coming months, a newly developed alliance of site selection firms will be positioning itself to take a proactive charge against this machine of negativity.\u00a0 We are confident our clients will stand behind us when the time comes, if the time comes.\u00a0 Until then, keep your head held high.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It was one thing when the $16 Muffin scandal was uncovered because it was mostly unfounded and a gross exaggeration of the truth to make a political point.\u00a0 It still had terribly undesirable consequences but once the flaws in the reporting were revealed, all that remained was some pretty disastrous public relations and the all [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2,1],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v20.3 - 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