Dear Otto,
At 8:54 +0200 13/09/04, Otto Spaniol wrote:
Dear all,
There are some severe errors in Event Request Form. It needs to be simplified and corrected.
One of the errors is that it should read:
Break even number of participants = (FE - FI)/(VI - VE) instead as of: (FI - FE)/(VI - VE) Thus we have a sign error!
Indeed!
Furthermore many organisors use "Total Income" instead of FI and "Total expenses instead of FE. This is probably due to the fact that the corresponding lines are so near to each other. As a consequence they come up with (for example) 0.07 number of participants in order to break even. (See the attached document as an example).
It would be best to create a quite simple Excel sheet where the organisor would have just to fill:
- The category of the event (working conference etc. in order to calculate the IFIP fee automatically)
OK
- The duration of the event (in days)
OK
- The expected number of (full paying!) participants without invited speakers, local people etc.
OK
The expected contributions from supporters etc.
The expected income from tutorials
The expenses (pre event and during event)
The expected expenses per particpant (proceedings, coffee,..).
Frankly, I don't see a need for this in the ERF as I explained in my previous email. This mini-budget is so summarized that the organizer could put in any number and nobody (including IFIP) could verify it. Moreover IFIP (including WG chair, TC chair) has no incentive to verify it, because there is no risk/surplus sharing. And last but not least, it is the main reason why the ERF is so much delayed in general.
All the other numbers (contingencies, break even,...) would then be calculated automatically by Excel.
I see no need for contingencies and break even for the same reason.
But I would add:
- One field to compute automatically the fee per participant (based on the number of days and the category of the event).
- Then another automatic field would be the *expected* fee to IFIP (i.e. the previous amount times the expected number of participants).
The informations concerning "surplus share to IFIP" ect., are mysterious and nobody has used these informations in practice. Thus they might be cancelled.
If we want to preserve the possibility for IFIP to share the loss/surplus, then such a field is useful. But in this case a detailed budget has to be provided, much more complete than the few fields above.
A field should also be preserved to indicate if a loan is requested, with a clear indication that it has to be reimbursed (i.e. no risk sharing by IFIP "in principle").
Best regards, Guy
Best regards Otto
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