Case Studies

The Problem

This inner city hotel has traded successfully for many years and continues to do so. The venue has numerous bars and function rooms, including a Manhattan style rooftop entertainment area. Unfortunately a period of poor bookkeeping put the hotel behind with the authorities including the ATO, resulting in declining profitability. Due to the poor bookkeeping:

• The hotel was not adequately monitoring its costs, especially with regard to its food and beverage purchasing and its product pricing was not helping the bottom line
• GST reporting was complicated and difficult to interpret, making it difficult and time consuming to prepare Business Activity Statements
• Staff were not receiving payslips nor were they being paid their compulsory superannuation contributions
• The hotel had poor cash and inventory management resulting in increased susceptibility to theft

• Implementing regular reporting whereby management were able to monitor and reduce their purchasing costs by reducing the number of suppliers and the size of the orders
• Simplifying GST reporting
• Implementing processes to assist management comply with the Superannuation rules and pay superannuation to staff
• Conducting a process review for cash and inventory management and implementing new processes to improve internal controls for both