| Mark Your
Calendars!
2004 PECCTAC Annual General Meeting
will be held at the Marilyn Adams Genealogical Research Centre
on February 24th at 7pm. Come out and meet your fellow members!
NEW:
FINANCIAL PLANNING AND RISK MANAGEMENT GUIDES FOR SMALL OPERATORS
The Canadian Tourism Commission (CTC) has just released some
new publications targeted at tourism industry operators. The
goal is to improve the competitiveness of Canada’s tourism
industry. While applicable to all organizations, these publications
are focused on small-and-medium-sized enterprises. Risk Management
Guide for Tourism Operators is focused on delivering best
practices and tools for managing risk in the tourism industry,
and provide the basic understanding of insurance principles.
Tourism operators must manage the prominent risks of their
business, and maintain stable cost-effective insurance coverage.
The guide was developed to help tourism operators improve
their financial performance.
Finding Funding: Ten Steps to Meet
Your
Financial Needs is designed for tourism operators whose businesses
require financing and who need assistance in approaching a
lending institution. Like the first guide, this step-by-step
guide is specially suited for small and medium-sized operators.
The ABCs of Financial Performance Measures and Benchmarks
for Canada’s Tourism Sector is a series of six guides
written for tourism operators who have little or no experience
in the area of finance.
These guides will help you better understand the language
of accounting and finance, maximize utilization of the financial
planning spreadsheet, and discuss with more self-assurance
your financial plans with investors.
The guides become progressively more sophisticated as you
work through them. The six guides are:
• Guide 1 - Financial Planning: Key to Maximizing Your
Bottom Line
• Guide 2 - Profiling Your Financial Statements
• Guide 3 - Financial Performance Measures and Benchmarks
for Canada’s Tourism Operators
• Guide 4 - Decision-making Tools for Canada’s
Tourism Operators
• Guide 5 - Linking Your Financial Performance Measures
to Your Business Plan
• Guide 6 - Industry Financial Averages and Benchmarks
for Canada’s Tourism Operators Customized
financial planning spreadsheets to use with the guides will
be available early in 2004.
All these publications are available direct from the CTC
through their Web site: www.canadatourism.com. You may also
call the CTC at: (613) 946-1000. E-mail: ctc_feedback@ctc-cct.ca
A Great Initiative!
The Prince Edward/Lennox & Addington Community Futures
Development Corporation is in the process of putting together
an application under the Ontario Small Town and Regional (OSTAR)
Program. This application will ask for 50% of the costs for
the preparation of a Prince Edward County Film location Guide.
We jointly believe that this Guide will be a significant generator
of economic benefit to the entire County by virtue of, firstly
the expenditures made by the film/TV people during location
construction and shooting, and secondly the exposure of the
County to an extremely large theatre or television audience.
What An Opportunity!
At the last Bay of Quinte Tourist Council meeting it was reported
that the new ferry service from Rochester to Toronto would
present an opportunity to promote our area in Rochester. Bay
of Quinte Tourist Council will make contact with Tourism Rochester
to explore mutual promotion possibilities. The ferry will
hold up to 750 passengers, 220 cars & 10 busses. The one-way
cost to take your car is $40.00 plus $20.00 pp and the trip
takes 2¼ hours. For more information on the ferry service
visit www.spiritofontario.com
Take Advantage!
Please see the enclosed agenda outlining “Beyond the
City Lights Conference” scheduled on April 6, 2004 in
Belleville. The Prince Edward County Chamber of Tourism &
Commerce fully supports this very worthwhile event.
FYI
High insurance premiums have hit all businesses!
It was recently reported in the Globe & Mail (November
15, 2003) that increases of upwards of 200% have hit the snowploughing
companies. While some businesses have their own snowploughing
equipment many do not and require the services of an independent
contractor for snow removal.
<One disturbing trend we have seen is for the snow removal
contractors to request a contract be signed which makes YOU,
the business they are doing snow removal for, responsible
for any claim that may occur from their snow removal operations.
Do not sign such a contract. You should make sure that the
snow removal contractor you are hiring has adequate insurance
coverage. Request a certificate of insurance confirming that
the contractor has at least $1,000,000 in general liability
insurance and automobile liability. You should also request
that your business be added as an additional insured with
respect to the snow removal for your property. In this way,
you will make sure that you will not be stuck paying a claim
caused by the snow removal contractor’s negligence.>
Excerpt from Ontario East Tourism Corporation
The new federal Privacy Act,
(or Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents
Act),
will apply to all Canadian businesses, including tourism operations,
as well as all non-profits, starting January 1, 2004. Previous
TFO Board meetings discussed that Ontario would enact its
own privacy law as of January 2003. That never happened and,
to date, there is no indication that Ontario will enact its
own privacy law anytime soon. Therefore, the federal Privacy
Act will apply to Ontario (and to any other province that
does not have its own privacy law).
The federal Privacy Act has implications for tourism operators
regarding guest registration, marketing research, marketing
and loyalty programs. The key provision, as it impacts our
industry, is the collection of guest information. In this
age of guest preferences and mass marketing, operators must
take action by January 1, 2004 to be in compliance with the
federal law.
Any collection of guest information exceeding what is normally
on a business card or in a phone book is now impacted by the
federal Privacy Act.
Informed (written) consent must be received from the guest.
All operators should immediately implement plans to meet the
requirements of the new federal Privacy Act. Collection of
information through guest registration, for example, which
you later use for your marketing programs and keeping note
of the guest’s preferences, is legal because it benefits
the guest. However, informed consent must be given by the
guest on your Registration Card.
Exemption: The federal Privacy Act does not apply to information
collected on an individual if it is used strictly and only
for personal benefits to the guest, and is not used anywhere
else. Your obligations: Every operator is required to comply
with certain principles set out in a Schedule to the Act.
There are 12 such requirements outlined in an Executive Summary,
an example of which is: “Consent to the collection,
use or disclosure of personal information must be informed
(written) and, except to the extent required for the supply
of a product or service, cannot be imposed as a condition
of such supply (i.e.: informed consent must be given for the
collection of personal information). Change your Registration
Card to reflect consent.”
A detailed Executive Summary prepared by the Hotel Association
of Canada on the federal Privacy Act, as well as a sample
guest consent form, can be found at www.hotelassociation.ca
click on
“Newsworthy Info” or visit www.privacyforbusiness.ic.gc.ca
Welcome
New Members!
West Lake House B&B
The Morning Star B&B
PURTEK Environmental
Lake Consecon Resort
Bee & Bee Bed&Breakfast
Pine Tree Cottage
Thank you for your support!
Protect Your Identity
The Internet and e-mail is an important way for people to
conduct business today. Be cautious on how you conduct your
personal and business affairs online as there is an increase
in Identity Theft. Some safeguards are as follows:
· Never input your personal information, including
PIN’s or passwords unless you have verified the correct
site. It is best to input the web or e-mail address yourself.
That way you can be assured you have the correct contact.
· Never respond to an e-mail message requesting a user
name, password, credit card number, or any other personal
information.
Questions regarding security or on how to protect your personal
information can be found at the Canadian Bankers Association
website – www.cba.ca
Farewell
It was with mixed emotions that I announced my retirement.
After 20 years with the organization I have seen many changes.
When I started I was employed by the Quinte Isle Tourist Association
and the Chamber of Commerce paid a fee for service. When the
two groups became one the workload appeared to decrease as
there was only one set of minutes, one Board of Directors
etc. but such was not the case.
During the years I have been very fortunate to work with great
Boards of Directors. It has been a good job for me and to
me. I have enjoyed coming to work each day and I know I will
miss the day-to-day routine, but mostly I will miss the people
with whom I have met over the years.
I do not have any immediate plans upon retiring just to stay
at home and devote more time to my Lodge of which I have been
a member for over 30 years.
Thank you to you the members for the past 20 years. Also to
the Board of Directors and especially Lawrie who has been
so great since my announcement in making the transition from
old to new so smooth. To Jan, I wish you the best of luck
and I know from experience the members and the Board will
treat you well.
It is always difficult to say goodbye – so I will say
“Adios Amigos”.
Babbs
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