Business Studies
Topic: Documents Handled By The Receptionist
The receptionist keeps some documents in her office, enabling her to carry out her duties efficiently and successfully. The following are some of the documents handled by the receptionist:
1. Visitors Slip
This is one of the documents found in the receptionist’s office. It is usually in loose sheets. Visitors who enter the receptionist’s office are given a visitor’s slip to fill out. This shows: who the visitor is, what he has come for, the officer he wants to see, and whether or not his visit is an appointment, etc.
The visitor fills out the slip and writes his particulars: name, address, the purpose of the visit, and whether the visit is an appointment. The receptionist then takes the slip to the officer concerned.
The officer will then decide whether the visitor must come in or wait. Without a visitor’s slip, the receptionist may politely obtain their information orally. If the officer is on the appointment, it is easier because the officer concerned may not keep him waiting for so long.
2. Visitors Book
Although a visitor’s book differs from a visitor’s slip, they are similar in content and meaning because they all aim to get information about the visitor and his purpose for visiting. While the visitor’s slip is given to individual visitors to fill in their particulars, after which they are passed into the office of the officer concerned for comment, the visitor’s book is usually a booklet kept in the office where the particulars of all the people that visit the organization are kept.
This book is sometimes referred to as Register of Callers. It contains the following information: name and address of visitors and time of visit, telephone number of visitor, the officer visited and the purpose of visit, time of departure, and the visitor’s signature.
It should be noted that visitor’s books are of various designs. Any design adopted by a company is good for that company. No one design is better than the other because they all contain the same type of information.
3. Telephone Message Pad
The receptionist keeps this to record telephone messages for the organization’s officials. Sometimes, the receptionist may answer a telephone call from her absent boss.
She should record all the messages received through the telephone in the Telephone Message Pad and present them to her boss when he returns.
There is also a decline in this aspect of the receptionist’s duty due to the Global System Mobile Telephone (GSM) emergence. Most callers nowadays communicate through the private mobile lines of the company’s officials who they wish to interact with. Hence, only a few companies nowadays maintain Telephone Message Pads.
For the effective recording of telephone messages, the telephone should be placed on the left-hand side so that the receptionist can handle the telephone with the left hand while she writes with the right hand or vice versa if she writes with the left hand.
The officer concerned should be made to see the telephone message taken on his behalf as soon as possible. However, the emergence of GSM is gradually phasing away this document as callers usually call such officers directly through their mobile phones.
4. Business Card Or Complimentary Card
This is a small card, usually measuring 9cm by 5cm, kept by the owner of the card and issued to people (by the owner) who wish to know who he is, where he works, and the type of work he does. Business card, therefore, contains particulars of the owner of the card. It is also called Complimentary Card.
Business card contains particulars of the owner of the card such as the name of the officer, the name of the company where he works or which he owns, office and residential address and telephone numbers, official designation of the owner, the type of business he engages in, etc.
There is no particular form for a business card, which is why no two business cards can look the same, but they perform the same function- showing the particulars of the card owner.
5. Telephone Directory
The telephone directory is a book published formerly by the Post and Telecommunication (P&T) but now by the Nigerian Telecommunication (NITEL). It contains the telephone numbers, names, and addresses of all the companies and private individuals that own telephones, otherwise known as subscribers.
The list of telephone owners (subscribers) and the telephone numbers of the company’s customers or clients they wish to contact. Most directories have yellow pages containing advertisements for various companies and products.
6. Diary
The diary is a book used by the receptionist to record daily events, including appointments kept on behalf of her boss and or other officers of the company.
The diary is consciously and carefully arranged in that it contains all the days and months of the year in chronological order, and some contain market days. This arrangement makes it easier for the receptionist to use it to record and locate whatever information is recorded at a glance.
Some diaries have provisions for telephone numbers and addresses of callers.
Other information that can be found in most diaries includes: names and addresses of important hotels and guest houses, addresses of embassies, countries, and their capitals would map showing important routes such as air routes, railway routes, etc.
However, anyone other than the receptionist could use diaries for private purposes. Students, traders, housewives, and company directors use diaries based on their circumstances.
7. Appointment List
This is a document kept by the receptionist for keeping the list of people on appointment with the company. This helps the receptionist to know at a glance the callers that may be expected for each day and the time they are expected.
Moreover, having known about these callers, she is better positioned to remind her boss and, if necessary, other officers concerned.
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