Money, Money, Money

While I have been at my internship, I have noticed how complicated money aspects are. I realize that money is the reason for a company to even exist and for people to have jobs, but I would think that everyone would understand the importance of that and be more on top of financial aspects.

The first I noticed of the money problems was when my supervisor was going over reports and realized that on the Activity by Cancel Transaction Report it said "Requires Attention" for the amount of $2,350. This means that the money did not get charged due to an error or it was rejected. Therefore, we are missing out on that money, which is supposed to be for the CVB. She then checked another recent report for a different conference group and it was short $550. When she went into the computer system, Passkey, it would not allow her to recharge the credit cards that had an error or were rejected for whatever reason. So, she had me make a spread sheet for both groups that listed the person's name, the amount of money they owe, their acknowledgment number, their company name, type of credit card, the last four digits of the credit card, the name of the card holder, and whether the fee was rejected or there was an error. Once those were finished, she emailed them to Passkey in order to figure out the problem. We have yet to hear back from them regarding the situation.

Another thing I noticed that would seem to be more orderly are the housing invoices. My supervisor had me organize three binders and a stack of papers. The binders included information about invoices, revenue, rebates, refunds, copies of checks, Passkey bills, and deposits. The binders were supposed to be kept in order, consisting of the same type of things in them, but they were all mixed up. It was a challenge to even organize the stack of papers she gave me because the binders were so messed up, but in the end it worked out and my supervisor was happy with the result. It seems like they would want to keep the binders in order so that it is easier to keep track of who still owes them money and who does not.

The third major money problem is about commission that is supposed to be received by the event organizer's company and the CVB. WWE Wrestle Mania had an event in March and the hotels that the people stayed at were supposed to send a check to the event organizer for an agreed upon amount based on the total room nights. The amount owed to the company is $10, 008.70, but only a combined total of $2,759.40 has been sent out from six hotels. Furthermore, the GPCVB gets 10% of the $10,008.70, which comes out to about $3,000. When only six of the 33 hotels have paid their commission, that is a huge issue, which I find unacceptable when it has been nearly four months since the event was held. My supervisor had her assistant send an email blast out to all the hotels that have not paid, but, in the email the assistant told everyone to contact me about it. At first I was really worried, especially when I was getting emails from the hotels saying that they had paid or that they were never told the amount that they owe, but now I am loving this task. I am having to sort out everything to be sure that we received the proper amount of money from each hotel. I created an Excel spreadsheet to help keep track of everything, along with a binder that separates who has paid, who has been sent an invoice, and who we are waiting to hear back from regarding a copy of the already paid check or a list of reservation cancellations or no shows to have back up information to match the adjusted room night totals and invoice amounts. It is a very tedious and important task and I am not even sure if I will be there long enough to complete the process because there is no telling how long it is going to take to hear back from all the hotels. However, I would be delighted if I did get to experience the end of it!