Dear Nicky,
One of my clients has asked me to quote a project that I have not done before. I'm struggling to figure out how to price it, and am wondering if it's OK to ask my NPAworldwide partners for their advice and assistance.
Pricing in Prescott
Dear Prescott,
Thanks for asking! The scenario you describe above can have some pretty serious legal implications if not handled carefully.
In many parts of the world there are anti-collusion laws and price-setting laws that declare activities by any organized group, like NPAworldwide members, to set, establish or agree upon a price as an illegal activity. Businesses must operate independently to determine prices to customers. If members are discussing pricing, there is a very real legal risk that those discussions can be viewed as price-fixing.
So while you are certainly free to conduct competitive information gathering and coaching, you may NOT do those activities inside any sort of public forum. Specifically, as related to NPAworldwide, this means there cannot be any discussions of pricing at our meetings or events, on any of our forums or blogs, via any bulk email services, on our technology platforms or similar.
Additionally, you should always document the sources of the information you gather so that no one can later claim that your business "colluded" with other businesses to establish a price.
Nicky
send letters to: nanderson@npaworldwide.com