CASE STUDY BAD TIMING AT THE BANQUET page $290-291($Produced by G$.$G$.$ Fenich and Students from East Carolina University$)$

Rob Clifford is the director of food and beverage at the Homey Hotel in New York, New York, which has a $10-$room, $6,000-$square$-$foot banquet$/$meeting facility. Sue Collins is an event planner in New York City who has been planning a very important employee recognition$/$awards dinner banquet for a large, local company in the city. She has arranged to have the dinner at the Homey Hotel. The dinner will be for $450$ people, served buffet$-$style with three separate buffets, and the total cost for the event has come to approximately $$45,000.$

The schedule for the evening is supposed to go as follows:

$5$:$30$ p$.$m$.-$Arrival of guests$/$cash bar opens

$6$:$00$ p$.$m$.-$Welcome speech given by the company president $($guests mingle aster welcome speech before dinner$)$

$7$:$00$ p$.$m$.-$Dinner $($buffet is to be opened$)$

$8$:$30$ p$.$m$.-$Awards given

$10$ p$.$m$.-$Adjourn

Rob has spoken to Sue about the schedule for the night, and she has told him that they still plan on eating and want the food ready at $7$ p$.$m$.$

During the welcome speech, the president of the company welcomed his employees, recog$-$nized the board of directors, and briefly talked about how the night will go$.$ Unexpectedly at the end of his speech, around $6$:$15$ p$.$m$.,$ he gives the board of directors the go$-$ahead to begin helping themselves to the buffet. The board of directors followed by three other groups of VIP guests sitting at reserved tables got up and proceeded to the buffet lines. The Homey Hotel hadn't planned to put their cold food out on the buffets until $6$:$35$ p$.$m$.,$ followed by their hot food around $6$:$45$ p$.$m$.$ The Homey banquet staff immediately began bringing out food, but it took almost $15$ minutes to get all the food ready on all three buf$-$fets. All food was brought out while the boarc of directors and the VIP guests were stand$-$ing in line waiting.

Although Rob and the rest of the Homey staff acted quickly to this unexpected change, the president of the company was furious that the board of directors, his VIP guests, along with himself had to wait in line while food was put out and into chaffers. Because of how unhappy he was about the food, the president of the company is refusing to pay the full amount of money that he owes to Sue, and Sue is demanding a discount from the Homey Hotel food and beverage department. The Homey feels that they did their job by speaking to the event planner prior to the beginning of the event to confirm the time that the food should be out, and that it is not their fault that the president invited guests to the buffets $45$ minutes prior to the scheduled time. Do you feel that Rob should honor the request and discount their event? Why or why not?