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Venue Preparation Tasks

Event management requires site preparation. This section provides information about preparing the event site. Preparing the event site requires several tasks, including researching and choosing a venue, assigning rooms within a venue to individual sessions, arranging for needed materials, and setting up the site just before the event begins.

Researching and Choosing a Venue

A venue is a physical facility where an event may be held, such as a conference center or hotel. In Siebel Events Management, you can store information about possible venues ahead of time, including their rental rates, and later choose which venue or venues to associate with an event. An event can be associated with multiple venues. A session within an event can be associated with only one venue.

During or after an event, you can enter review comments about how well each selected venue functioned for your event. These comments can be useful for planning future events.

The following procedure lets you record information about the equipment that is available in a potential room for an event.

To enter a location for an event venue

1. Navigate to the Site Map > Events > Event Plans view.
2. In the Event Plans list, select and drill down on the event for which you want to enter a venue.
3. Click the Schedule view tab, and then click Events.
4. In the Events list, select and drill down on the event.
5. Click the Resources view tab, and then click Venues.
6. In the Venues list, create a new record.

NOTE:  You can also select a venue on the Details form's Venue field on both Events and Sessions lists.

After you enter a location as an event venue, you can specify venue rate codes for an event. If the venue is a hotel where event attendees stay, or—if you do business with the venue regularly—you may have negotiated special rates for hotel rooms, conference rooms, and so on. Special rates may be associated with codes that attendees or event managers mention to the venue representative. The following procedure describes how to store information about venue rate codes.

To associate venue rate codes with an event

1. Navigate to the Site Map > Events > Event Plans view.
2. In the Event Plans list, select and drill down on the event for which you want to record venue rate codes.
3. Click the Schedule view tab and then click Events.
4. In the Event list, select and drill down on the event.
5. Click the Resources view tab and then click Venues.
6. In the Venues list, select the venue for which you want to enter information.
7. Scroll down to the Billings list and select Rate Codes from the drop-down list.
8. In the Rate Code list, create a new record.

   The following table describes some fields in the Rate Code list.

   Field	Comments
   Code	The code to mention to the venue representative in order to receive the special rate, such as SEBL123.
   Comments	A text field to record other information, such as Customer must mention rate code at time of check-in.
   Name	A name of your own choosing, to identify the rate code, such as Marriott Siebel User Week Promotion.
   Type	A description of the special rate, such as 20% discount off lodging rates.

At any time during the event management process, you can enter review comments regarding the venues you are working with. For example, you might want to note the name of a particularly helpful venue representative, or mention that a particular work crew might need closer supervision if the venue is reused for a future event. For more information about entering reviews, see Entering Venue and Vendor Performance Reviews.

Entering Venue Expense and Billing Information

After you have entered a location as an event venue and optionally specified venue rate codes for an event, you can enter venue expense and billing information. Expense records created at the venue level roll up to the event, with a Cost Type = Venue. Venue billing records are a detailed breakdown of a single venue expense record, indicating room and room rate information.

To enter venue expense information

1. Navigate to the Site Map > Events > Event Plans view.
2. In the Event Plans list, select and drill down on the event plan for which you want to enter venue expense information.
3. Click the Schedule view tab, and then click Events.
4. In the Events list, select and drill down on the event.
5. Click the Resources view tab, and then click Venues.
6. In the Venues list, select the venue for which you want to enter expense information.
7. Scroll down to the Expense list, and create a new record.
8. In the Expense list, complete the necessary fields.

To enter venue billing information

1. Navigate to the Site Map > Events > Event Plans view.
2. In the Event Plans list, select and drill down on the event for which you want to enter billing information.
3. Click the Schedule view tab, and then click Events.
4. In the Events list, select and drill down on the event.
5. Click the Resources view tab, and then click Venues.
6. In the Venues list, select the venue for which you want to enter billing information.
7. Scroll down to the Expense list and select the expense for which you want to enter billing information.

   NOTE:  An event must have a venue before you can add a venue to its session. Rooms can only be selected after a venue for the session is selected.

8. Scroll down to the Billing subview, and create a new record.

   The following table describes some fields in the Billing list.

   Field	Comments
   Room	A required field that displays the rooms available within the venue. You can select a room from the dialog box.
   Billing Basis	A value for the interval at which the room use is charged. The drop-down list displays typical values of Per Person, Per Item, Hourly, Daily, Weekly, and so forth.
   Billing Rate	The negotiated rate from the account screen for the venue. You can edit the billing rate amount.
   Quantity	A value for the number of rooms within the venue.
   Flat Fee	The flat charge for the room. For example, there may be a setup or booking charge that is not reflected in the Billing Basis or Billing Rate fields.
   Total Cost	The actual room cost calculated by multiplying the billing rate times the quantity plus the flat fee. {(Rate*Quantity)+Flat Fee}
   Comments	A text field for other information associated with the billing record.

After you create one or more billing records, you can update the actual cost of the parent expense record to reflect the total cost of the billing records.

To update the actual cost of the expense record

1. Navigate to the Site Map > Events > Event Plans view.
2. In the Event Plans list, select and drill down on the event plan for which you want to update venue expense information.
3. Click the Schedule view tab, and then click Events.
4. In the Events list, select and drill down on the event.
5. Click the Resources view tab, and then click Venues.
6. In the Venues list, select the venue for which you want to update expense information.
7. Scroll down to the Expense list, and click Update Actual Cost.

Setting Up at the Venue

When you have chosen a venue, assigned rooms to sessions, and arranged for materials, most of the remaining preparation activities take place onsite, within a few hours of the start of the event. Onsite activities may vary across events, but the following list includes some typical setup activities:

• Setting up chairs
• Setting up and testing computers
• Setting up and testing audiovisual equipment
• Setting up collateral displays
• Setting up a check-in area for registered attendees
• Setting up a registration area for walk-in attendees

Siebel Events Management does not provide special screens, lists, or forms for onsite setup tasks. Use the Activities list to plan and track these actions, as described in Activity and Staff Management Tasks.