Committee: Gloria Won, (chair) , Tilly Roche, Doug Varner, and Ron Schultz

Comments and observations:

• Anticipate ‘big-ticket’ costs such as audio-visual (media) equipment rental charges, exhibition company charges, deposits, food/facility costs, service charge, sales tax, etc.
• Prepare preliminary budget at least 4 months before event. Use expense reports from previous joint meetings (see attachments), obtain estimates from service providers, or use ‘best guess’ by chairs of each committee
• Determine the net profit NCNMLG would like to earn (ask Executive Board for guidance); include this amount in the determination of registration fees (revenue). If the intent is to make a substantial profit with the Joint Meeting, then we must charge more for registration/CE/event/exhibits.
• Coordinate the determination of fees with Joint Meeting chairs and Exhibits, CE, and Program Chairs.
• Include the cost of meals for speakers and presenters in the calculation of the registration fees. Lunches are provided gratis to speakers and CE instructors throughout the meeting, and speakers and presenters do not pay conference fees unless they plan to attend the programs. Are such gratuities the norm?
• May be necessary to ‘pad’ the expense portion of the preliminary budget to cover ‘unforeseen’ expenses (this year, the ‘pad’ was $300 – but, $1000 is more realistic)
• Do competitive bidding for contract services; ask about hidden or additional costs
• Bring to the Joint Meeting, a cash box and $10-$20 in change, prepared blank spreadsheets (ideally, a laptop and a printer to manage bookkeeping activities and food counts) to record transactions handled at the meeting – Nearly 40 transactions, i.e., late registrations, and other cash and check payments for meal and event orders, were recorded at the San Jose meeting, a receipt book – several meeting attendees and exhibitors asked for a receipt – writing a receipt ‘on-the-spot’ would eliminate additional post-meeting paperwork
• Get volunteers to help staff the Registration table (this was where all financial transactions took place) during scheduled registration times and during breaks to collect payments, take meal orders, sell tickets to special events, and record and tally transactions. Because Registration and Hospitality tables were adjacent to each other, Hospitality staff helped out with staffing coverage, too -- so this arrangement worked out nicely.
• Use a database management program to log registration information. This year, the registration log was created in MS Excel, which computed total costs easily, and showed the registration information in an easy-to-read columnar format. But counting the number of participants had to be done manually – grueling work, I assure you. A database management program can compute costs and do counts on the number of participants with great ease. (Perhaps MS Excel can do counts, too – if anyone knows how, I’d like to learn).
• Be forewarned. Completing post-meeting spreadsheets is extremely time-consuming. I’m having a difficult time reconciling registration counts/amounts with actual deposits.
• Develop a close relationship with the Treasurer and the Registration Chair. Collecting attendance and revenue data requires frequent interaction with both of these individuals. I am fortunate to work with two who are extremely patient and supportive.
• Be resigned to the fact that the post-meeting spreadsheet may not be completed for several months after the Joint Meeting.
• Delegate
• Use a consistent style for the presentation of the Revenue and Expense reports from year to year and maintain the multi-year comparison tables. Future Finance Chairs may find the attached spreadsheets helpful.

• When designing forms, send draft to Joint Meeting team for their editorial assistance. Emily Fang did this with the evaluation form and received invaluable suggestions. We did not do this with the registration form. Consequently, the final registration form had some problems. Some thought the late fee applied to the CE’s only; one thought she didn’t need to pay for the box lunch; and how does one know that one need not pay the registration fee if one is only taking a CE? The form also lacks an area for the Registration Committee to record information such as, check #, check date, date received
• Include the registration form with invitation letters to exhibitors so companies can make payments for the exhibit fee, registration, and meal selections prior to the meeting. This year, letters were sent to exhibitors before the completion of the registration form. Confusion and more work were the consequence. Several exhibitors paid for their meals/event at the Joint Meeting; some didn’t realize they could join us for meals/events until it was too late; and, at the writing of this report, two exhibitors have yet to pay for their Friday lunch.
• Individuals who only sign up for a CE – why are they exempt from paying a conference fee?
• Hold Joint Meeting on weekdays to avoid the added cost of overtime labor costs for weekend laborers (our exhibits service contractor who worked Saturday to dismantle exhibits, charged an additional $850 for overtime).
• Schedule CE’s before the conference, not the end. With the CEs scheduled on the last day, the meeting ends in an anti-climax. If scheduled before the conference, the momentum builds toward a climatic end – a much more exciting finish!
• Appoint a Food & Event Coordinator/Chair to coordinate food/event-related activities, such as, make food selections, design and collect meal tickets, manage meal counts (# of people and the # of vegetarian meals), monitor meal/event setup, work with Registration/Finance Committees, interface with Fairmont staff, and troubleshoot problems. During this meeting, Mary Beth, Ron and I each wore this ‘hat’ at different times – the process worked, but the approach was fragmented. A chair with a committee would have made the entire process smoother.
• E-mail is a useful means of passing information to various team members, but more face-to-face meetings would be helpful. Meeting once a month as we near the Joint Meeting and twice monthly during the last two months seems reasonable.
• Put handouts and taped lectures on our NCNWeb
• The food was delicious and the desserts were fabulous!
• Finally, despite the last-minute nature of this Joint Meeting, I’m amazed at the results this group was able to achieve. I’d be glad to work with any one of this team anytime.