<B> Meetings Buyers Approach The Millennium With Caution</B>
By Chris Davis
Like their counterparts on the transient side of corporate travel departments, meeting buyers with groups planning to hit the road in the early days of January 2000 are keeping a sharp lookout for sightings of the Y2K bug.
Insiders said their chief concerns include the attrition clauses in their contracts, the readiness of small and foreign-based suppliers to deal with possible millennium-change-related computer problems, telecommunications issues and financial transactions.
The potential for Year 2000 computer problems stems from the inability of many computers to read beyond the last two digits in the year of a given date, a technical glitch that in many cases requires the rewriting of millions of lines of computer code to fix. Without such programming adjustments, computers could read the last two numbers of the year 2000 and believe your meeting to be scheduled--and completed--in the year 1900.
While the bugs surely will be worked out as quickly as they appear, planners agree that meetings scheduled for the month of January will require some extra preparation. Many are simply sidestepping the issue by erasing the month entirely from their corporate meetings calendars.
"My advice is to avoid planning critical business meetings in January if possible," said Joyce Bembry, manager of global business travel for Wilmington, Del.-based Dupont Co. "If that isn't possible, make sure the meeting property has a manual record of all reservations and plans, because they could be dropped or canceled automatically if systems are not fully functional."
While major domestic airlines and hotel chains have given assurances that their services will not be affected by the bug (<a href"http://www.btnonline.com/db_area/archives/1998/10/98101207.htm"><I>BTN,</I> Oct. 12, 1998), many smaller meeting suppliers will have a more difficult time completing the required reprogramming by Dec. 31.
"Smaller vendors may not be aware that not all Pentium computers purchased two years ago are Y2K ready, and they may not have the expertise to analyze which of their equipment may be dependent on such issues," said Hugh Lee, president of Fusion Productions, a Webster, N.Y.-based meetings production and technological development firm. "Planners need to have a Plan B in the wings."
Meeting buyers should seek written proof of Y2K compliance or a written guarantee from all their suppliers, even if a contract already has been signed, advised Joan Eisenstodt, president of Eisenstodt Associates, a conference consulting and management firm in Washington, D.C.
"You need guarantees that hotels will have all systems operational: door systems that use cards, security systems, anything computer-operated," she said. "You need to know how they will prove compliance and also how they will compensate for any lack thereof."
A particularly potent potential source of trouble is international meetings, particularly in less-developed nations that may not have the resources to correct bugs in their systems in time.
"It's unknown how deep this bug is in equipment and software, especially in older equipment that has been redistributed without bug fixes to lesser technology-prepared countries and companies," said E.J. Siwek, president of Bethel, Conn.-based meetings software supplier SCLM Software.
"If it turns out to be true, then careful planning should be used when traveling, banking and electronically transacting while abroad," Siwek added.
Yet another unpredictable factor will be the number of meeting attendees who don't show up because of last-minute fears or real technical glitches. With that in mind, planners might want to negotiate attrition clauses that aren't as rigid or punitive as usual for what likely will be a slow month for vendors.
"Many people say they are not going to travel in early January, so a second look at attrition clauses should be considered," Eisenstodt said. "It's not an 'Act of God,' but people deciding not to travel is not something meeting sponsors can control."
"Planners who have attrition clauses in place should be evaluating the situation to determine whether they should reduce their blocks," agreed Jonathan Howe, president and senior partner at the Chicago-based law form of Howe and Hutton.
"If I'm a planner doing a short-term meeting and I'm signing contracts now, I would want a real good opportunity to review them, especially if they're for the first or second week of January. If I have a meeting in February or March, I might want to wait and see what happens on Jan. 1 and then have the ability to make adjustments as may be required."
For their part, the hotels seem unconcerned with what the month of January will bring, and virtually every chain with whom Meetings Today spoke said it has no plans to offer any special deals to build business during the world's first confrontation with the Y2K bug.
"We're not going to entice a customer to stay at a Marriott hotel as a way to get over a hurdle," said Susan Hodapp, brand director for Marriott Hotels, Resorts and Suites. "Instead, we demonstrate to customers how extensive our Y2K program is."
Hyatt Hotels and Wyndham Hotels and Resorts also do not plan to offer any special deals for January, they said.
Indeed, there's always the possibility that the transition into the year 2000 will be perfectly smooth and uneventful.
"I personally don't think many planners are going to feel any direct impact of Y2K," said Chicago-based meetings consultant Jim Daggett.
"The biggest concerns I think we should all have are with the airlines and with our attendees' ability to use automatic teller machines on the road," he said. "I would guess that most major companies--hotel companies, airlines, etc.--are doing everything they can to correct this problem in advance. But I hope I'm not being naive.