Project Attrition

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American Academy of Physician Assistants
Amy L. Phillips
Director, Meetings and Industry Relations
703-836-2272 x 3403
amy@aapa.org

The AAPA has been successful at avoiding attrition damages to date largely because of the organization’s passion for research and the meetings database built over the past nine years. Amy Phillips has supported AAPA’s in-house research effort to fully understand their attendee and exhibitor booking patterns and behavior. This allows Amy and her staff to build significant advantage and leverage in negotiating contracts for future Annual Meetings. For example, AAPA has been collecting these trend data for nine years and knows that generally speaking that the 9000 attendees, fall into the following categories:

3800 generally are booking inside the official block
1500 are generally local for most large urban destinations
1500 are booking outside the block

Additionally, Amy studies each destination under consideration for the future and compares the attendee data with the destination to better understand what percentage of potential attendees who live in the region would attend the meeting and not necessarily require hotel accommodations. This allows her to forecast and make appropriate changes in guest room block requirements from year to year as necessary. Additional research is conducted on an on-going basis at every annual meeting to learn more about attendee behavior and specifically learn as much as possible about attendees who choose to stay outside the official block. This on-going data mining effort helps AAPA build its position and leverage in all future contract negotiations.

AAPA has also instituted several housing-related policies that also assist in meeting forecasts and managing the guest room block. The following is an edited excerpt from this year’s advance meeting materials.

“New This Year! As usual, busing will be provided from the conference hotels listed on this page to the Convention Center, the (headquarters hotel) and special events. As in the past, hotel guest room rates quoted include a rebate to offset busing costs. As a result, only those attendees booking their hotel reservations through AAPA’s official housing vendor are eligible to ride on the AAPA’s shuttle buses. Registrants, who book their guest room via the official form on page 8, will receive a bus sticker with their badge. Be sure to place the sticker on your badge to facilitate boarding. If you do not reserve your guest room using AAPA’s housing service, you must purchase a bus sticker for an additional $30 fee at the registration area to use the buses. Local attendees who wish to use the shuttle will receive a bus sticker free of charge with proof of local residency.”

Exhibitor Housing & Travel Discounts
AAPA has also instituted policies and programs defining exhibitor housing and travel discounts.

Guest Room Allocation
Guest rooms required for representatives staffing exhibitors’ booths must be requested through Navigant International, AAPA’s official housing bureau. Additional information will be mailed with your booth assignment. Exhibitors may secure hotel guest rooms for a maximum of six representatives for each 10’ x 10’ booth. For those companies assigned multiple booths, the guest room allotment will be determined by the Academy based on past guest room block requests and actual guest room utilization in past years. Requests for housing in excess of this number must receive approval from the Director of Meetings.

Housing Requests
Housing requests must be received no later than April 12, 2003. However, early registration will give you a better opportunity to obtain the hotel of your choice. In addition, all requests must be in written form, utilizing the registration form provided with your booth confirmation. No telephone reservations will be accepted.

Deposits
The first night’s deposit for each guest room requested must accompany the housing request. Housing requests will not be processed without a deposit check or credit card.

Guest Room Blocks
Adequate hotel guest rooms have been blocked for use by exhibitors at several of the official conference hotels. To obtain a block of guest rooms for exhibitor representatives at the specially negotiated rates, a deposit for each guest room requested must accompany the housing request. Credit cards will not be charged at the time the reservation is given to the Academy’s housing bureau.

All guest rooms within an exhibiting company’s guest room block will be considered final as of April 4, 2003. Companies actually using 85 percent or more of the guest rooms blocked as of April 4 will be given preferred status for housing in 2004. In addition, to protect the Academy’s total housing block and to allow the Academy to resell guest rooms to our members, exhibiting companies using less than 70 percent of the guest rooms in the final block as of April 4 will be considered in violation of Academy housing policy and will not receive exhibit points accumulated for the 2003 year. Guest room pick-up will be determined by comparing the guest rooms in the block as of April 4 to guest rooms actually used during the conference.

Individual names should be provided at the time guest rooms are requested. However, if specific names are not available and reservations are to be held in the convention coordinator’s name, a list of guest room occupants must be received by the AAPA housing bureau on or before April 12. After that date, all guest rooms without an occupant’s name will be returned to the AAPA for possible use by other attendees.

Preferred Status
Preferred status is defined as follows:

Companies blocking 10 or more guest rooms, which picked up 85 percent or more of their guest room block as of the specified cut-off date in the preceding year, are entitled to receive preferred status for the current year. The actual pick-up information is obtained from the hotels in the Academy’s official housing block. Companies who have earned preferred status would be notified by a separate letter.

Companies achieving preferred status will receive their housing information and request forms two weeks earlier than the other exhibiting companies. This will give the companies with preferred status an earlier opportunity to select guest room blocks at hotels of their choice.

This preferred status for hotel selection and availability would only last two full weeks before the remaining companies’ housing information is mailed. After that time, housing requests will be processed on a first-come, first-served basis.

NOTE: Each company’s hotel block will be considered final as of April 4, 2003. Guest room pick-up will be determined by comparing the guest rooms in the block as of April 4 to those same guest rooms actually used during the 2003 conference.

Guest room Changes/Cancellations
Prior to April 12, all changes or cancellations must be made through the AAPA housing bureau. For guest rooms canceled April 13 or later, cancellations must be made directly with the hotel. The hotel will not issue refunds for any guest rooms cancelled, per the Academy’s cancellation policy.

Travel Discounts
Arrangements have been made to provide annual conference attendees airline and car rental discounts through AAPA’s designated travel agency. To make your reservation, please call 866/805-6918 or 713/369-1241, e-mail: association@sc.navigant.com between the hours of 8:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. CST. To take advantage of the lowest possible airfares, please call by May 4!

©2004 Convention Industry Council
Contact the CIC

American Academy of Physician Assistants
Amy L. Phillips
Director, Meetings and Industry Relations
703-836-2272 x 3403
amy@aapa.org

The AAPA has been successful at avoiding attrition damages to date largely because of the organization’s passion for research and the meetings database built over the past nine years. Amy Phillips has supported AAPA’s in-house research effort to fully understand their attendee and exhibitor booking patterns and behavior. This allows Amy and her staff to build significant advantage and leverage in negotiating contracts for future Annual Meetings. For example, AAPA has been collecting these trend data for nine years and knows that generally speaking that the 9000 attendees, fall into the following categories:

3800 generally are booking inside the official block
1500 are generally local for most large urban destinations
1500 are booking outside the block

Additionally, Amy studies each destination under consideration for the future and compares the attendee data with the destination to better understand what percentage of potential attendees who live in the region would attend the meeting and not necessarily require hotel accommodations. This allows her to forecast and make appropriate changes in guest room block requirements from year to year as necessary. Additional research is conducted on an on-going basis at every annual meeting to learn more about attendee behavior and specifically learn as much as possible about attendees who choose to stay outside the official block. This on-going data mining effort helps AAPA build its position and leverage in all future contract negotiations.

AAPA has also instituted several housing-related policies that also assist in meeting forecasts and managing the guest room block. The following is an edited excerpt from this year’s advance meeting materials.

“New This Year! As usual, busing will be provided from the conference hotels listed on this page to the Convention Center, the (headquarters hotel) and special events. As in the past, hotel guest room rates quoted include a rebate to offset busing costs. As a result, only those attendees booking their hotel reservations through AAPA’s official housing vendor are eligible to ride on the AAPA’s shuttle buses. Registrants, who book their guest room via the official form on page 8, will receive a bus sticker with their badge. Be sure to place the sticker on your badge to facilitate boarding. If you do not reserve your guest room using AAPA’s housing service, you must purchase a bus sticker for an additional $30 fee at the registration area to use the buses. Local attendees who wish to use the shuttle will receive a bus sticker free of charge with proof of local residency.”

Exhibitor Housing & Travel Discounts
AAPA has also instituted policies and programs defining exhibitor housing and travel discounts.

Guest Room Allocation
Guest rooms required for representatives staffing exhibitors’ booths must be requested through Navigant International, AAPA’s official housing bureau. Additional information will be mailed with your booth assignment. Exhibitors may secure hotel guest rooms for a maximum of six representatives for each 10’ x 10’ booth. For those companies assigned multiple booths, the guest room allotment will be determined by the Academy based on past guest room block requests and actual guest room utilization in past years. Requests for housing in excess of this number must receive approval from the Director of Meetings.

Housing Requests
Housing requests must be received no later than April 12, 2003. However, early registration will give you a better opportunity to obtain the hotel of your choice. In addition, all requests must be in written form, utilizing the registration form provided with your booth confirmation. No telephone reservations will be accepted.

Deposits
The first night’s deposit for each guest room requested must accompany the housing request. Housing requests will not be processed without a deposit check or credit card.

Guest Room Blocks
Adequate hotel guest rooms have been blocked for use by exhibitors at several of the official conference hotels. To obtain a block of guest rooms for exhibitor representatives at the specially negotiated rates, a deposit for each guest room requested must accompany the housing request. Credit cards will not be charged at the time the reservation is given to the Academy’s housing bureau.

All guest rooms within an exhibiting company’s guest room block will be considered final as of April 4, 2003. Companies actually using 85 percent or more of the guest rooms blocked as of April 4 will be given preferred status for housing in 2004. In addition, to protect the Academy’s total housing block and to allow the Academy to resell guest rooms to our members, exhibiting companies using less than 70 percent of the guest rooms in the final block as of April 4 will be considered in violation of Academy housing policy and will not receive exhibit points accumulated for the 2003 year. Guest room pick-up will be determined by comparing the guest rooms in the block as of April 4 to guest rooms actually used during the conference.

Individual names should be provided at the time guest rooms are requested. However, if specific names are not available and reservations are to be held in the convention coordinator’s name, a list of guest room occupants must be received by the AAPA housing bureau on or before April 12. After that date, all guest rooms without an occupant’s name will be returned to the AAPA for possible use by other attendees.

Preferred Status
Preferred status is defined as follows:

Companies blocking 10 or more guest rooms, which picked up 85 percent or more of their guest room block as of the specified cut-off date in the preceding year, are entitled to receive preferred status for the current year. The actual pick-up information is obtained from the hotels in the Academy’s official housing block. Companies who have earned preferred status would be notified by a separate letter.
Companies achieving preferred status will receive their housing information and request forms two weeks earlier than the other exhibiting companies. This will give the companies with preferred status an earlier opportunity to select guest room blocks at hotels of their choice.
This preferred status for hotel selection and availability would only last two full weeks before the remaining companies’ housing information is mailed. After that time, housing requests will be processed on a first-come, first-served basis.
NOTE: Each company’s hotel block will be considered final as of April 4, 2003. Guest room pick-up will be determined by comparing the guest rooms in the block as of April 4 to those same guest rooms actually used during the 2003 conference.

Guest room Changes/Cancellations
Prior to April 12, all changes or cancellations must be made through the AAPA housing bureau. For guest rooms canceled April 13 or later, cancellations must be made directly with the hotel. The hotel will not issue refunds for any guest rooms cancelled, per the Academy’s cancellation policy.

Travel Discounts
Arrangements have been made to provide annual conference attendees airline and car rental discounts through AAPA’s designated travel agency. To make your reservation, please call 866/805-6918 or 713/369-1241, e-mail: association@sc.navigant.com between the hours of 8:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. CST. To take advantage of the lowest possible airfares, please call by May 4!