Front_Office_Operations

Chapter 5– Guest accounting

Banking

The computer can reconcile too:

Figure 5.2: Bank reconciliation screen (in Sage software)

Source: wikLbath.ac.uk

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Chapter 5– Guest accounting

Cash floats

4.Cash floats

4.1How much should be kept in a cash float?

4.2Administering the cash float

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Chapter 5– Guest accounting

Cash floats

A small stock of ‘ready money’ must be kept to enable it to give change(when guests pay their bills), to offer currency exchange facilities (whether available) and to allow for Visitors Paid Outs (VPOs). These small stocks of cash are called ‘cash floats’.

A small hotel may keep a single cash float, administrated by the cashier. A larger hotel may require a number of different floats, to cover a range of points of sales: the restaurant, the bar, the shop etc.

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Chapter 5– Guest accounting

Cash floats

4.1 How much should be kept in a cash float?

The amount to be kept in a cash float will depend on:

●The type, value and number of cash transactions handled

●The hotel's policies on upper limits for cash transactions (e.g.. VPOs or currency exchange).

●Security considerations, since as little cash should be exposed to the risk of theft as possible (and large cash floats a attract theft or robbery attempts).

●Cost-of-money considerations, since cash not in the hotel’s bank account is not earning interest (or reducing the size of the bank's overdraft).

Each sales point should have a pre-established float amount and make-up (different note and coin values), and this should be the same from day-to-day, for efficiency and ease of control.

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Chapter 5– Guest accounting

Cash floats

4.2 Administering the cash float

Cash floats are stored in secure cash drawers (or cash registers/tills), with compartments separating th different notes and coins. The cashier or receptionist is responsible for:

●The security of the float

●The accuracy of payments and change giving

●The balancing of the float at the end of the shift.

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Chapter 5– Guest accounting

Night audit

5.Night audit

5.1What is night audit

5.2Night audit tasks and reports

5.3Anticipating bad debts

5.4Computerised audit functions

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Chapter 5– Guest accounting

Night audit

5.1 What is night audit?

In a small hotel, the night auditor may be the night manager, receptionist and security officer all rolled lot into one. But (s)he will also use this otherwise quiet period to perform the methodical work of processing, checking and balancing, so that the hotel's records are fully up-to-date and 'ready to go' for the following day, and the busy check-out period. In a larger hotel, there may be a dedicated night auditor or night audit team for this purpose.

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Chapter 5– Guest accounting

Night audit

5.2 Night audit tasks and reports

Some of the tasks which may be carried out by the night auditor, in a manual system, are:

●Posting outstanding guest charges which have come in during the evening or night (late arrivals, room service or telephone calls), to keep guest accounts fully up-to-date for morning check-out time.

●Verifying posted entries: checking that vouchers have been posted to the correct accounts and correcting them, if not. (e.g.. a guest has a restaurant charge on their account, a corresponding amount should be listed in the restaurant till roll, and there should be a signed restaurant chitty for the transaction).

●Balancing the tabular ledger: ensuring that each guest's total debit entries minus total credit entries equals the balance carried forward to the next day's entry; and ensuring that all column totals balance.

●Balancing the accounts: checking that total sales/takings recorded by each department add up to the total of debit charges recorded in the tabular ledger. (e.g.the total recorded on the bar's

till roll or other revenue report should equal the total amount in the 'bar' column of the

tabular ledger.

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Chapter 5– Guest accounting

Night audit

5.2 Night audit tasks and reports continued…

●Verifying cash balance: checking that cash balances shown in the accounts correspond to the amount of cash in the safe; and that total cash minus the day’s takings equals the stated cash float amount – to ensure that no cash has ‘gone missing’ during the day!

●Checking the safe: verifying that guest valuables logged for safekeeping in the safe are (still) there!

●Verifying room status records, by cross-checking the front office room status display (for ‘room rack’) against:

−The housekeeper’s report on room status, to identify discrepancies which may need correction or further investigation: e.g.. rooms logged as ‘vacant’ when they are really ‘occupied’ – or vice versa.

−The financial records and guest accounts. A room may be listed as vacant but have an outstanding guest account open – or it may be listed as occupied, but without a guest account. Or charges may have been recorded for one occupant, when the room rack – or housekeeper’s report – says that two people are staying in the room. It indicates that there is an error somewhere, which must be

sorted out.

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Chapter 5– Guest accounting

Night audit

5.2 Night audit tasks and reports continued…

●Checking and clearing the reservations file. The auditor will prepare a list of non-shows (a for those report), so that the cashier can prepare a bill (and/or process a credit card payment) for those with guaranteed bookings.

●Preparing management report, such as revenue reports; daily occupancy reports; guest statistics; and ect.

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