HOSPA – the UK hospitality industry’s leading educational organisation for Financial Management, Revenue Management and IT professionals – is delighted to announce that it has formed a strategic partnership with the ICAEW Tourism and Hospitality Special Interest Group – a part of ICAEW, a world leading professional membership organisation that promotes, develops and supports over 144,000 chartered accountants worldwide.
The ICAEW Tourism and Hospitality Group offers its members access to information updates and news through e-Library resources, journals, articles, market research reports, and catalogues of reading materials. There is also a technical enquiry service for industry-specific questions. In addition, there are monthly newsletters, packed with sector news and developments, as well as changes to legislation. The ICAEW Tourism and Hospitality Group online community provides latest opinion and commentary.
Under the new agreement, the first official event to be hosted by HOSPA for ICAEW Tourism and Hospitality Group members to attend, will be a seminar on ‘Implementing the new 11th edition of the Uniform System of Accounts (USALI)’ – to be held at 6pm on 19 May 2015, at the Jumeirah Carlton Tower, London. The speakers will include: Richard Harrington, Regional Director of Finance, Europe at Langham Hotels; David Nicolson, Vice President Finance – Europe, Jumeirah International UK; and Roberto Amodei, Area Director of Finance, UK and Ireland, Hyatt Hotels Corporation, who will all discuss the various stages of implementation of the new 11th edition of the USALI, published in January 2015. To register for the free-of-charge event, email: jenny.rose@hospa.org
Commenting on the strategic partnership, HOSPA Chief Executive Carl Weldon said: “We are very pleased to be working with such an influential organisation as the ICAEW Tourism and Hospitality Group. It is a natural fit for us as the Group, like HOSPA, is interested in trends and all aspects of finance and associated technology in the hospitality industry. For our part, HOSPA can benefit the ICAEW Tourism and Hospitality Group members by providing very specific hospitality Revenue Management and IT expertise and information, over and above the core shared discipline of finance.
“To further support them in this respect, HOSPA will be offering Tourism and Hospitality Group members special rates for attending our highly acclaimed HOSPACE Annual Conference and Exhibition – due to be held this year on 26 November at the Sofitel London Heathrow, Terminal 5.
“Our first joint event on ‘Implementing the new 11th edition of the USALI’ promises to be a most informative and invaluable discussion – with a top line-up of speakers explaining how they went about implementing the new edition, the lessons learned and the stages they are at. Also they will be examining the issues arising from adopting the latest edition of the USALI.”
Ian Graham, Chairman of the ICAEW Tourism and Hospitality Group, added: “I am really pleased that this alliance has come into being – in my view, it offers great value to both HOSPA and ICAEW members. Both organisations have education, professional standards and knowledge sharing as core principles. As professionals, we share similar standards and throughout our careers make use of education for ourselves and our teams, as well as Continuous Professional Development.
“HOSPA is a deep sector-specific organisation and includes IT and Revenue Management expertise, as well as Accounting and Finance. The ICAEW Tourism and Hospitality Group of 3,000-plus finance professionals – working both in industry and the profession around the world – has a wide scope addressing all tourism sectors, as well as hospitality.
“As a result of the alliance, I have no doubt that individual members of both organisations will have the opportunity to share and gain knowledge that will assist them and their teams in their jobs, careers and professional roles.
“The ICAEW Tourism and Hospitality Committee look forward to a long and fruitful collaboration with our colleagues and friends at HOSPA.”
In summary, the strategic partnership benefits to ICAEW Tourism and Hospitality Group members are: discounted access to selected HOSPA events and the annual HOSPACE Conference and Exhibition; knowledge of HOSPA’s highly regarded industry-specific Financial Management and Revenue Management education and training programmes, accredited respectively by the Open University and Oxford Brookes University; interaction with like-minded hospitality finance, revenue management and IT professionals; and access to selected content from HOSPA’s monthly magazine, The Overview.
Evolving from the British Association of Hospitality Accountants (BAHA), formed in 1969, HOSPA is a not-for-profit educationally focussed Association helping hospitality’s Finance, Revenue Management and IT professionals develop their careers and network, as well as keep up-dated.
Offering a wide range of growing opportunities and CPD options to over 1,100 members – from meetings addressing specific topics, to providing extensive professional resources and webinars, including an interactive website and access to the latest industry data in HOSPA’s monthly magazine ‘The Overview’ – HOSPA members remain at the cutting-edge of the hospitality industry.
HOSPA is recognised as the UK’s authoritative voice in the hospitality industry on financial management, technical accounting issues, taxation, hotel valuation and other related aspects. The Association is also the leading arena for debate on Revenue Management and hotel IT systems.
