The hotel incident report may only contain a few sentences. It identifies the guest, describes a disturbance and identifies the staff who responded and details the time management was notified.
The report may raise more than one question for an attorney. Who was accountable for supervising these employees? Was surveillance footage preserved? Did the property follow its prescribed procedures? Are there any previous interactions that were not recorded in the report?
These questions illustrate the reason why it’s often necessary to look over business records prior witnesses testify in a hospitality lawsuit.
Start by looking through the documents that were produced during normal operation
Hospitality businesses generate records for training, scheduling guests, guest service, security, and administration. Although they weren’t made to aid in lawsuits, they can be used to establish how a property functioned in the event of a specific incident.
A Hospitality expert witness may examine staffing schedules, operating procedures, employee training files, security logs, and surveillance recordings to understand the responsibilities assigned to different personnel. For example, a written policy might oblige a manager to take action to an employee’s report of an drunken guest.
Investigating whether or not the manager actually was working and whether or not the report was properly communicated and the response documented by the available evidence should be the primary objective. Instead of concluding that the procedures were adhered to or not, the goal is to find out what actually transpired.
The interpretation of restaurant records may be different
Restaurant investigations are challenging since employees must split their time between cooking food in the kitchen, serving customers and managing the dining space. An expert witness in the restaurant industry could help show how decisions made by employees are affected by these responsibilities.
Consider an incident in a dining room, involving a patron who purchased alcohol at the bar prior to taking a seat. The bar receipt could record the purchase at the beginning, while the dining-room transaction records indicate later purchases.
The records could not provide what the server’s information was about the previous service. Reexamining server assignments, transaction times, management notes, and employee declarations together will help to clarify the process. It is important to recognize distinctions: simply because alcohol was consumed doesn’t mean the staff was intoxicated.
Casino Investigations may require different records
Casinos have beverage programs that can differ substantially from standard restaurant service. Free drinks, mobile cocktail servers, gaming-floor supervisors, and extensive security procedures create additional sources of information.
A professional witness from a casino may review the beverage staffing assignments and surveillance footage, security reports and employees’ communication methods. The standard sales receipt may not be correct when complimentary beverages are involved.
In such a case the investigation could be heavily based on the surveillance evidence, observations of employees and service records as well as the procedures documented by the building. Experts should be aware of the weaknesses of evidence instead of relying on incomplete records as evidence.
Keep the evidence in place until it’s unavailable
Conserving documents with time-sensitive information is a crucial consideration in the context of litigation which involves hospitality. Surveillance systems may retain recordings for a limited time. Employee schedules, internal communications and incident documentation may be archivalized in different systems or departments. Attorneys must identify pertinent records and take the necessary steps early.
The nature of the investigation will depend on the type of allegations. A restaurant claim may require the bar’s and dining room’s records, while a resort incident could require documentation of the event as well as transportation arrangements and security communications. Targeted reviews help identify what records are essential without presuming that all departments were involved.
Understanding the paperwork is easier with experience from the operational side.
Preston Rideout is a hospitality veteran with more than 20 years of experience. He has held positions in bartending, management and beverages operations in a variety of divisions. Rideout Hospitality Consulting is a business he started in the year 2010. He has provided advice to the resort, restaurant and hotel operators across the United States.
His expert witness work includes matters that involve hotels, restaurants, resorts, and casinos for defense and plaintiff attorneys. It’s helpful to have an understanding of hospitality management for interpreting documents that appear simple to those who are not experienced in the field.
Staffing schedules, for example, identify who has been assigned to work. The service model and the operational requirements of a facility is crucial to establish if the assignments are supervised in a proper manner.
A better case for your argument starts with Simpler Questions
An early expert review helps attorneys differentiate evidence-based facts from issues that remain unresolved. It may also help identify what documents are worth seeking or clarifying the language that is used in depositions.
Each discrepancy does not indicate an operational failure however, not every document proves that the appropriate procedures were observed.
A professional analysis of hospitality is useful when it clarifies these distinctions based on relevant evidence and industry-recognized practices. For attorneys preparing an investigation into hospitality, knowing the operations prior to questioning employees can result in a more specific, convincing examination of what actually occurred.
