BEO (banquet event order)

The banquet event order is the document a hotel or catered venue writes for your event and hands to everyone executing it, from the kitchen and bar to the servers, the AV technician, and the setup crew. It lists the onsite contact, the date, the rooms used, start and end times, the attendee count, the menu and dietary accommodations, the room setup diagram, AV provision, terms and conditions, and an itemized list of everything the venue is responsible for and what each line costs. It evolves through planning and gets signed by both sides, at which point it functions as a contract for your use of the space and its services.

The BEO is written by the venue, which is exactly why the organizer’s job is to audit it line by line before signing. Read it as though you know nothing about the event, because that is the position the staff working from it are in. A wrong line is a wrong thing that will happen on the day. Many community venues in the Philippines never issue one, offering a quotation and a chat thread instead. The habit still applies: write your own one-page recap of everything agreed and ask the venue to confirm it in writing.

Source: Hospitality and catering industry practice. Cvent’s guide to banquet event orders describes the BEO as “a central document distributed to the entire team involved in executing an event” and “a line-item list of everything the venue is responsible for,” created by the catering or event manager, reviewed by both venue and planner, and signed. It also carries the practitioner advice to read the BEO “from the perspective of someone who has nothing to do with the event.”

First used in: 1.6 · The venue: selection to BEO.