What is a banquet event order (BEO)?
A banquet event order (BEO) is the document that tells the kitchen, bar and floor crew what an event needs: counts, menu, timings, room setup, who does what and, on the manager’s copy, the price. That is the BEO meaning in hospitality. Two filled-in banquet event order samples are below, a wedding and a corporate dinner, and the free BEO template lets you write your own.
By the MyVenueHQ team. Updated .
- It lists the timeline, guest count, menu and dietary counts, bar, room setup, staffing and special requests.
- Every team at the venue works from it for that one event.
- The client approves it before the day.
BEO meaning: what a banquet event order is for
The contract says what the client bought; the BEO tells your staff how to deliver it. The chef reads the counts, the bar reads last call, the setup crew reads the floorplan, and the captain runs the night off the timeline. No floorplan yet? The free floor plan maker draws one to scale and downloads it as an image, and the free seating chart maker puts the guests at the tables.
It works because there’s only one. When the guarantee moves from 118 to 120 it changes in one place, and nobody sets 11 tables from an old email while the kitchen plates for 120.
What goes on a banquet event order
Eleven parts. Small venues merge a few, but each one answers a question somebody will ask at 5 pm on the day.
- Event detailsName, date, room, start and end times, and a version number so staff know they hold the latest copy.
- On-site contactThe one person staff call when something needs a decision. Often the planner, not the client.
- Guest countExpected and guaranteed, plus the date the guarantee is due. The kitchen cooks to it; the invoice bills to it.
- TimelineEvery moment staff act on, each with a time.
- Menu and dietary countsCourses, service style, how many of each entrée, and every allergy as a number.
- BarHosted, cash or on consumption; what’s poured, where the bars are, the toast and last call.
- Room setupTables, seats per table, linens, dance floor and stage, with a floorplan that matches.
- AV and equipmentMicrophones, screens, lighting and power, who supplies each, and when it’s tested.
- StaffingRoles, counts and call times.
- Special requestsVendor arrivals and meals, decor, accessibility, anything that fits nowhere else.
- Billing and approvalPriced lines, deposit, balance, and signature lines for the client and the venue. Plenty of venues leave the prices off the kitchen copy.
Banquet event order sample: a wedding BEO, filled in
A complete BEO for a sample wedding at a sample venue; the corporate dinner at the top of the page is the other example. Print this page and only this one prints. The numbers reconcile: 98 short rib plus 22 risotto is 120, and so is 11 rounds of 10 plus a head table of 10.
Banquet event order
Grandview Hall · BEO 1042, version 3
Issued October 10 · Approved by client
Event details
- Event
- Whitfield and Nakamura wedding
- Date
- Saturday, October 17
- Room
- Garden Room and garden lawn
- Times
- 3:00 pm to 11:00 pm
- Guests
- 120 expected, 120 guaranteed
- Guarantee due
- October 3
Client and on-site contact
- Client
- Amelia Whitfield
- On-site contact
- The couple’s planner, name and mobile
- Venue lead
- Event manager on duty
Timeline
| Time | What happens | Where |
|---|---|---|
| 1:00 pm | Vendors arrive, setup begins | Garden Room |
| 3:00 pm | Doors open to guests | Garden lawn |
| 4:00 pm | Ceremony | Garden lawn |
| 4:45 pm | Cocktails and canapés | Terrace |
| 6:30 pm | Dinner service | Garden Room |
| 8:15 pm | Cake and speeches | Garden Room |
| 8:45 pm | First dance, dancing | Dance floor |
| 10:30 pm | Last call | Both bars |
| 11:00 pm | Event ends |
Menu · plated, three courses
| Course | Dish | Count |
|---|---|---|
| Starter | Burrata, heirloom tomato | 120 |
| Main | Braised short rib | 98 |
| Main | Wild mushroom risotto (vegetarian) | 22 |
| Dessert | Olive oil cake | 120 |
Dietary: vegetarian 6, gluten free 5, nut free 2, dairy free 1. Seat cards mark each one.
Bar and beverages
- Bar
- Main bar and terrace bar, two bartenders
- Service
- Beer, wine and signature cocktail
- Toast
- Sparkling wine, 120 pours at 8:15 pm
- Last call
- 10:30 pm
Room setup
11 rounds of 10 and a head table of 10, for 120 seats. Ivory floor-length linens. 20 by 20 foot dance floor in front of the head table, DJ booth beside it, cake table by the terrace doors. Floorplan attached.
Staffing
| Role | Count | Call time |
|---|---|---|
| Event captain | 1 | 12:30 pm |
| Servers | 10 | 2:30 pm |
| Bartenders | 2 | 3:30 pm |
| Setup and turn crew | 4 | 12:30 pm |
Special requests
Three vendor meals (photographer, DJ, planner) at 6:45 pm. Nut allergy at table 4. Couple’s own cake knife is with the planner.
Billing summary
| Garden Room, evening hire | $2,400.00 |
| Dinner package, three courses, 120 at $52 | $6,240.00 |
| Bar setup and two bartenders | $960.00 |
| Total | $9,600.00 |
|---|---|
| Deposit received | $2,400.00 |
| Balance due October 3 | $7,200.00 |
Client approval and date
Event manager and date
Sample venue, couple and figures.
How to write a banquet event order (BEO)
- Open the signed contract and the accepted proposal. The BEO says how you’ll deliver what was sold, so it can’t contradict either.
- Fill in the event details and the on-site contact before anything else.
- Write the timeline in the order staff will live it, and check dinner can’t start before the room flip is done.
- Add the menu with counts. Entrées should add up to the guest count exactly.
- Describe the room and attach a floorplan whose seats match that same count, then set the bar and staffing.
- Send it to the client to approve. Once they do, number the version and send it to every department.
When the guarantee lands, change the count, the entrée split, the table count and the floorplan together. A BEO goes wrong when those drift apart. Our guest count change checklist walks through all four. For the quantities behind the menu counts, the free catering food calculator works them out from the guest count, and the free wedding alcohol calculator does the bar.
Fill in your own banquet event order
The fill-in BEO template is a form you fill in online and download as an editable Word file, which opens in Google Docs and Pages, or print blank. It covers the same ground as the table above, with AV inside room setup, and leaves out billing and signature lines. If your venue puts the bill on the BEO, as the wedding sample does, add a billing summary and the two signature lines to the Word file before you send it.
BEO vs contract vs run of show
| Document | What it settles | Who reads it |
|---|---|---|
| Contract | Price, date, deposit, cancellation terms. Signed before the deposit. Twelve clauses to include, or fill in the free venue rental agreement template. | Client, venue sales |
| BEO | How the event runs: counts, menu, bar, setup, staffing, timeline. Approved once details are final. | Kitchen, bar, setup crew, captain, client |
| Run of show | The timeline only, minute by minute. Wedding run of show template, or build a wedding day timeline first with the timeline generator. | Captain, planner, DJ, photographer |
BEO terms and abbreviations
The shorthand printed on hotel and venue BEOs, and what each one means for the people working from it.
| Term | What it means |
|---|---|
| EXP and GTD | Expected and guaranteed guest count. The kitchen cooks to the guarantee, and the client pays for at least that many. |
| Set | How many places the crew actually lays. Often a few above the guarantee. |
| Overset | The extra places above the guarantee, so a late guest has a seat. Your policy sets how many. |
| ++ (plus plus) | The price is before service charge and tax. A $100++ menu costs more than $100 a head once both are added. |
| EO | Event order. What Marriott and some other hotels call the BEO. |
| F&B | Food and beverage: the menu, the bar and anything else catering serves. |
| A/V | Audiovisual: microphones, projectors, screens and sound. |
| ROS | Run of show, the minute by minute schedule. On a small event it’s the BEO timeline; on a big one it’s its own document. |
| Resume | A summary of a whole group’s program across days and rooms. Each function on it gets its own BEO. |
| Version or revision | The number that tells staff which copy is current. Anything printed with a lower number goes in the bin. |
Four mistakes that cost you on the night
Counts that don’t add up. If the entrées total 118 on a BEO guaranteed at 120, the kitchen cooks 118.
A floorplan from an older version. The BEO says 12 rounds, the drawing shows 11, and the crew follows the drawing every time.
Dietary needs without numbers. Nobody can plate “some vegetarians”; they can plate six.
No version number or on-site contact. Staff can’t tell which copy is current, and when rain moves the ceremony indoors there’s no one to call.
BEO software vs a spreadsheet
A spreadsheet template is fine until the details change, which they always do. Every change then gets retyped from the email into the proposal, the contract, the invoice, the BEO and the floorplan, and one of them gets missed.
MyVenueHQ builds the BEO from the booking, so the date, room, client and guest count are already there. You fill in the schedule, the menu with dietary restrictions, the bar and last call, room setup, staffing by role and special requests. The event’s floorplan from the floorplan builder attaches to the room setup and prints on the kitchen copy, and each BEO is approved or sent back to draft with notes.
It’s on the free plan, for up to 10 events a month. For a single event, the free BEO template needs no account at all.
BEO questions.
What does BEO stand for?
Banquet event order. In hospitality it’s the operating plan for one event at a hotel, venue or restaurant. Some venues call it an event order (Marriott says EO) or a function sheet; it’s the same document.
Who writes the BEO?
Usually the event manager or catering sales manager. They build it from the contract and the client’s choices, get the client’s approval, then send it to the kitchen, bar and floor.
When should a BEO be final?
On the guarantee date in your contract, the day the client commits to a guest count. Anything that changes after that goes out as a numbered revision.
Is a BEO legally binding?
Not on its own. The contract sets price and terms; the BEO sets how the event runs. Once the client signs it, though, most venues treat it as part of the agreement, so the counts and prices on a signed BEO are what you bill. If the two disagree, your contract should say which one wins.
What is a beo wedding?
A wedding BEO is the banquet event order for one wedding: ceremony and reception times, the menu with entrée counts and allergies, the bar, the room flip, vendor meals and staffing. The sample above is one.
What does beo mean in restaurants?
Banquet event order, the same as in hotels and venues. A restaurant that takes private dining or buyouts writes one per party so the kitchen and the floor work from the same menu, count and timings.
What should a beo include?
Event details and a version number, the on-site contact, the guest count, a timeline, the menu with dietary counts, the bar, the room setup, staffing and special requests. Many venues add a billing summary on the manager’s copy.
How to write a beo?
Start from the signed contract and the proposal, fill in the event details and on-site contact, write the timeline in the order staff live it, add the menu with counts, then the room, bar and staffing. Have the client approve it and send one version to every department.
What is the standard service sequence for a banquet?
For a plated dinner: seat the guests, pour water and wine, serve the first course, clear it, serve mains, clear again, then dessert and coffee. Serving the head table first is the old convention; plenty of venues now go table by table. The BEO timeline gives each course a time so the kitchen and the floor move together.
How many BEOs does one event need?
One per function is the usual rule. A wedding with ceremony, cocktails and dinner often fits on one; a conference with three meals in three rooms gets three.
Where can I find a banquet event order template?
The free BEO template on this site: fill it in online and download it as an editable Word file, or print it blank. No account is needed. It has event details, timeline, menu with counts, bar, room setup, staffing and special requests. Add a billing summary and signature lines if your venue puts them on the BEO.
What does a banquet event order sample look like?
The two samples on this page: a wedding for 120 guests from 3 pm to 11 pm, with 98 short rib and 22 risotto, and a corporate dinner for 80. Each has event details with a version number, a timeline, a menu with counts, the bar, room setup, staffing, special requests and a billing summary, and the counts add up to the guarantee.
What is the difference between a BEO and a contract?
The contract sets price, date, deposit and cancellation terms, and is signed before the deposit. The BEO sets how the event runs once the details are final: counts, menu, bar, setup, staffing and timeline. The BEO should never contradict the contract.
Free BEO template 
Free event floor plan maker 
Free catering food calculator