This breaking news was passed on by a friend and RateAlert subscriber...........I felt I had to share it with you to keep you abreast of current events.
 

Feds Revamp Waitress Compensation Due to e coli Poisoning

Regulators are proposing a change in how food servers in the United States are paid due to recent e coli poisoning at a local restaurant. E Coli (short for “Escherichia coli” ), can cause serious food poisoning in humans and the bacteria is responsible for occasional product recalls due to unsanitary conditions at Major Slaughterhouse ‘s around the country. Clearly the fault of the food server known as the “Waiter” or “Waitress”.

Mr. Tommy Aikey awoke a few days ago with food poisoning after having a Steak meal served by Wendy Knowfalt, a food server at “Steak and Ail”.

After Tommy Aikey reported the incident to local authorities, the legislators and regulators quickly got to work on a new bill that will prevent this type of food poisoning in the future. From the experts within the government, all indications show that clearly the waitress was at fault for the ordeal.

Here is a breakdown of the new regulation and the three main components.

* and waitresses will no longer be able to have their tips or other compensation based on the type of the meal they serve or based on the servers experience level, or service levels to the customer. For example:

• A Waiter or Waitress may not be paid more for a steak dinner, than a Shrimp or chicken dinner. They must be paid the same regardless of whether the food comes out warm, or cold due to any delay where the food was prepared while the server was on break.

• When customers order their meal, they must be presented with a minimum of 3 different menus from competing restaurants in the area.

• The customer must wait 3 hours to order their meal after signing a disclosure showing what type of salad, starch and vegetable will be served with the meal. If the restaurant owner provides these “ancillary” items – he may not charge a higher margin on one item over the other.

* to the waiter/waitress must be either paid by TIPS from the consumer, or by credit card – NOT by BOTH.

i. Note that for these purposes, both the Restaurant itself AND the Wait staff are considered “Servers”, thus – if the Credit card option is used to pay the cashier (owner of the restaurant), then NO TIPS may be accepted by the waitress.

* Provision and Safe Harbor.

i. A “Server” may not “Steer” a consumer into a meal by a certain animal type if they will receive greater compensation from that meal, than in other meals which may have been offered the consumer… unless the offered meal is in the consumers best interest (Safe Harbor).

* that it is unclear within the proposed law how far this legal definition goes, and the Feds are offering NO CLARIFICATION. If the same steak dinner is available 2 blocks away, is it in the best interest to send the client to the competing restaurant?

* serving Steak over Salmon in the best interest of the consumer’s health. All questions that have severe penalties and will only be clarified during future inspections of the restaurant by the Food Inspector.

Lastly, in another unrelated law that is being considered called QRM, or Qualified Reluctant Meals- certain Restaurant owners should be aware that they may have to eat 5% of the consumers meal prior to serving.

On a serious note, I'll be releasing some tidbits from Thursday's Fed hosted Outlook webinar for those that missed it, or want clarification from it.  I'll also be releasing the RateAlert Executive Fed Comp Q&A Sessions schedule later this morning.

Don't worry, we'll make it through this. :)

Today is the day the world awaited (since 9/21); at 2:15 the FOMC statement will come and finally markets will know for sure what the Fed is about to do on the QE 2 easing move. Going in to it, there is widespread belief that the treasury buying will total $500B and accomplished over a six month period. The Fed is always concerned not to shock financial markets so it is unlikely that whatever their plan it won't rattle markets with something well off target.

The election results are about what was expected; the House to Republicans, the Senate stays with the Democrats. No noticeable market reaction to the results as they were widely expected. Treasuries and mortgages opened better this morning; at 8:15 the Oct ADP non-farm private jobs report hit, expectations were for an increase of 23K jobs as reported ADP said private jobs increased 43K. In Sept ADP reported private jobs were down 39K, today it was revised to -2K. Better than expected but still no real new hiring; there was no reaction to the report in either the stock or bond markets. 

At 9:30 the DJIA opened +10, the 10 yr note +12/32 at 2.55% -4 bp and mortgage prices much better; +12/32 (.37 bp) on 30s and +7/32 (.22 bp) on 15s.

At 10:00 Sept factory orders were expected up 1.7%; orders increased 2.1% and Aug orders were revised to unch frm -0.5% originally reported.

Also at 10:00 the Oct ISM services sector index, expected at 53.5 frm 53.2 in Sept, was better at 54.3. The new orders components increased to 56.7 frm 54.9, employment component at 50.9 frm 50.2 in Sept and price index at 68.3 frm 61.1.  There was no initial reaction to the data; although stronger with the FOMC statement later today markets are storing the data but not reacting yet.

Waiting now for the FOMC policy statement this afternoon. How the Fed will do the so-called easing, how much, when and comments about the economic outlook should be included in the normally short statement that concludes the meeting. It is uncertain how traders will take the easing move, how the dollar trade will occur, and what the market expectations will be on any direct benefits of an easing move. As noted previously, the Fed appears determined to increase the inflation rate by weakening the dollar with the QE. Fixed income investments in US treasuries at the current low levels may be a hard sell to investors if markets believe the Fed will be successful in bringing up the inflation rate back to their perceived target range of 2.0% to 2.5%. A quantative easing will bring interest rates down as long as economic data points are weak, however recent data has been fractionally better than estimates on some of the key data. The markets may not react much on the FOMC statement with Oct employment scheduled Friday. Present estimates after the ADP report this morning are being revised better than prior to the ADP, from estimates of 60K non-farm private job gains to 80K to 100K, still very weak but may bother traders with inflation concerns resting right under the surface. No rally in the bond market and mortgage market if inflation fears increase.

The MBA today released its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending October 29, 2010 at 7:00 am.  The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, decreased 5.0%.  The Refinance Index decreased 6.4% from the previous week. This is the third straight week the Refinance Index has decreased.  The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index increased 1.4% from one week earlier. The four week moving average for the seasonally adjusted Market Index is up 0.1%.  The four week moving average is down 2.7% for the seasonally adjusted Purchase Index, while this average is up 0.8% for the Refinance Index. The refinance share of mortgage activity decreased to 81.3% of total applications from 82.3% the previous week. The average contract interest rate for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 4.28% from 4.25%, with points increasing to 1.07 from 1.00 (including the origination fee) for 80% loans.  The average contract interest rate for 15-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased to 3.64% from 3.67%, with points increasing to 1.08 from 0.96 (including the origination fee) for 80% loans.

Treasury announced the details for next week's quarterly refunding; $32B of 3 yr notes on Monday, $24B of 10 yr notes on Tuesday, and $16B of 30 yr bonds on Wednesday.

Not looking for much movement now until 2:15 with the FOMC policy statement release.

As we draw towards the end of April, it seems the more things change, the more they stay the same.

Huh?

Let me explain.

So far, we have been looking at some pretty heavy changes in the real estate world - the end of the Fed MBS purchase program, the coming end of the homebuyer credits (I'm thinking the end for real this time, anyone got news otherwise?), even more guideline changes to make qualifying harder, increases in the cost of the transactions (FHA upfront MIP, and in the summer, FHA will lower the amount allowable for seller concession/contribution), and the need to take course after course, test after test, so we can keep doing what we've been doing for years.

Even though there is all this change is coming at us like lane markers on the highway, ever notice that some things still stay the same?

Like the need to stay informed.  Keeping up on guidelines (though harder) is more important than ever.  The market is crazy and volatile (today was a TWO PRICE IMPROVEMENT day!).  Being informed is only half the battle - having the ability to inform others is the other half of the battle.  Today is a good day to see if you have updated your contacts in your COMPLIMENTARY subscription to Market Snapshot for your referral partners.  You can put up to 250 of your closest friends on your distribution list - and keep them up to speed with David Shirmeyer's top notch insight and advice.

So, while the world around us is busy, don't be too busy to take advantage of the stuff you already pay for.  And if you aren't an Executive RateAlert member with the complimentary subscription going out BRANDED to YOU, why are you waiting?

For today all, I'm done - have a great one!

Brian and I were at an event the other day and we were speaking to a Realtor that works for Keller Williams.  She was super excited to be with them because of how innovative they are.  One of the things she pointed out was that they offer coaching.  Their coaching is a little different with respect to how they get paid - the coach gets 10% of every closing.  Personally I think that’s pretty cool seeing how the coach’s pay is directly connected to the results of the person being coached.

So we asked her what the coach did for her.  I’ll make it short and sweet for you – even with all the technical innovations that are out there, the coach hammered her on “making her calls”.  It’s so interesting to me to make note of how sales has really never changed over the ages.  I read sales books almost every day to provide a sales tip for the TBWS Daily show, and I can tell you, it’s all about relationships and personal contact – that’s it.  The other thing that’s interesting to me is that in my 23 years in the mortgage sales industry, I’ve found that “personal contact” through “making calls” is the number one thing that salespeople don’t want to do – weird.

So all the sales greats say that we should make our calls and most of the salespeople in the world don’t do it.  Why?  This doesn’t make any sense.  Are all the sales teachers and coaches in the world wrong and all of the salespeople right?  Nope.  Based on my personal experience all of the coaches and teachers are 100% correct.  In mid 2006 I decided to get some coaching, so I could in turn coach the 50 loan officers I had working for me.  I found it with the Brian Buffini Company.

My coach had one thing in mind for me – make my calls (go figure).  The difference between me and most others is that I did it.  I wanted to see if there would actually be an increase in my business, so no matter how uncomfortable I felt about it, I picked up that phone and dialed.  I was making at least five calls a day for several months and tracking it.  The first thing I discovered is that literally everyone that I spoke to was very happy to hear from me – everyone.  No one was mad or irritated, they were genuinely glad to speak with me – weird.

The next thing I discovered was heartbreaking to me.  Within my first 50 calls or so, I realized that I had LOST about six deals within about a four month period from the people in my database.  These are my past clients, family and friends here.  Keep in mind, that although I wasn’t a “phone caller” I was very consistent with monthly mailers to stay in touch, and yet I still lost deals to my competitors.  Another startling discovery was the consistent responses from the people that “left me for someone else”.  I asked every one of them “why didn’t you give me a call? Have you been receiving my mailers?”  Their response was always something like “yeah, wow, I’m sorry.  I should have called you but “I was TALKING to this guy” and one thing led to another”.  Hmmm..  “Talking” to this guy?  Newsflash people – if you think for a second that your past clients, family and friends are 100% loyal to you even if you don’t make your calls – you’re simply being foolish.

The results were staggering.  During one of the most difficult times to generate business in our industry, I was originating and closing about six deals consistently every single month.  Now I know these numbers may not seem like much to some, but at that time in that market I was one of the top producers in my office and I was managing it.  I was watching good loan officer’s drop like flies around me as the market caved in around us and I was closing deals.  I did my best to coach them by encouraging them to make their calls.  I would show them my results as well, but mostly to no avail.  Only a few took heed to what I was doing, and guess what?  They are still in the business to this day.  All of the others fell away to leave the industry completely, why?  Because they didn’t have the guts to pick up the phone and simply “talk” to their past clients, family and friends and ask them for a referral – how sad is that?

Make your calls.

The sales tip on today's TBWS Daily show is really a great idea.  Napoleon Hill hits on the Master Mind concept pretty hard in chapter six of Think and Grow Rich.  Truth be told, we don't know it all, so if we really want to do something big we do need the help of others.  I would seek out (via referral) a small Master Mind team.  Get a Realtor, a CPA, a Lender, an Estate Attorney and an insurance person and you're good to go.

Then come up with an educational "Webinar" idea.  Work on it weekly together until you have the all the details penned out.  You can get an account at www.GoToWebinar.com pretty cheap, especially if your group shares the cost (why not, since you'll be doing these at least once a month right?).  Now you market the webinar via email to your databases, each to his own.  I would market it at least two or three times before the webinar.  These webinars can be set up so that when it's over, an email gets sent automatically to the participants.  This email of course would have the contact information for all of the "hosts" of the webinar, allowing the participants to make contact with them for their services.

It's a simple idea, but you need the right team. Remember, Hill tells us if we don't hit the "sweet spot" the first time, don't freak out.  Simply go back to the drawing board and keep what worked and re-tool what didn't.  Eventually you'll have a lead genertating machine on your hands.

Go for it.