Hotel Liaison

Hotel Liaison is the person (or position) that is familiar with the current convention operations, and is always in close contact with the manager of the hosting hotel. Depending on the hotel, the Hotel Liaison may have a "detailer" or other point of contact other than the manager; probably someone in the sales and catering department. However, the Hotel Liaison will also be the point of contact with other departments and should request from the hotel a list of all of their department heads and everyone who will be on staff during the convention. There may be a corresponding position for contact with the convention center manager.

The primary duty of the Hotel Liaison is to assure compliance with the terms of the hotel contract. If there are any points on which the hotel is not satisfying their commitments to the convention, or is trying to enforce policies that the convention specifically negotiated exceptions to, it is the Hotel Liaison who resolves these problems.

Secondarily, the Hotel Liaison should be ready to resolve any problems between the convention (or its members) and the hotel quickly, and preferably in the convention's favor. Convention security may come into play here as well. Hopefully, local law enforcement will not. The Hotel Liaison should strongly encourage the hotel to bring any issue with any member of the convention primarily to them and secondarily to Ops if the Liaison cannot be reached.

This duty might be shared among several people, but it is critical that there be no ambiguity as to who is "on duty" and ready to act at any given moment. Whoever your Liaison is, they should be an experienced Smof, both assertive and diplomatic, and very familiar with the operations of your particular convention.