Customer Tricks in the preparation of project evaluation by the Contractor
In the preparation of commercial proposals, especially for large projects, there are various difficulties and surprises. Many years of experience shows that many of them are repeated from project to project, which speaks of the Customer’s well-established techniques to reduce the cost of the project. Below is a description of several such tricks. They work especially well if the Customer succeeds in creating the impression “is about to conclude an Agreement”.
The customer is in a hurry with the assessment and with his whole appearance that he will not find fault with the assessment.
The calculation goes to the fact that the Contractor does not take into account all the nuances and considers only the main work, laying the possible nuances in the risks (in the form of overstating the cost of work).
After receiving the assessment, the Customer asks to list the scope of work in more detail. With detailed painting, the overestimated cost of individual works becomes obvious, after which the Customer can only point this out and ask for a reduction in the cost of work. The contractor is forced to give the value of the declared work without taking into account possible risks.
In this case, the Customer shifts the risks of unplanned costs to the Contractor.
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The customer asks to calculate the work as a whole for several objects (companies, branches, sites).
The expectation that the Contractor will try to save labor costs while performing the same type of work. After receiving the estimate, the Customer asks for separate estimates for each object. Although individual projects increase costs, the Contractor is forced to give estimates with the initial total cost.
In this case, the Customer assigns the Contractor’s savings resulting from the simultaneous performance of work of the same type.
The customer changes the initial data several times, each time requesting the control and the TT.
The expectation is that at some point the Contractor will get tired of preparing options and agree to conditions that are less favorable to him. Here several factors play into the hands of the Customer at once:
a) Customer's costs for changing the original data are significantly less than the labor and time costs of the Contractor for the preparation of a new proposal.
b) from the Contractor, one or two people, as a rule, work on the proposal; from the Customer, much more people can work on changing the source data. At the same time, the Customer’s people can work on separate parts of the Proposal, while the Contractor has to coordinate each change with all related parts.
c) When changing the cost of the project, the contractor is forced to renegotiate the proposal with his management each time, risking incitement after several iterations. The customer does not agree with the change of initial data with anyone.
In this case, the Customer transfers part of the costs to the Contractor, taking advantage of the Contractor’s lack of resources (time, labor, management loyalty) to assess the additional costs incurred.
Two more tricks, very primitive and even obvious, nevertheless used almost everywhere:
The customer hides the hard work in the list of simple works. For example, when discussing the protection system of the virtualization environment, most of the time will be devoted to information security tools, and only in passing will be mentioned the deployment of the target information system, which is waiting for the Contractor to deploy the server subsystem, storage system, virtualization environment and terminal access system.
The expectation that the Contractor will announce the assessment before recognizes the size of the elephant. Refusing the stated assessment is fraught with loss of reputation, on which the customer plays.
The customer pushes at the price and at the same time (sometimes implicitly) promises further cooperation on the results of the project. Often the Contractor is pressed through the works and delivery at a loss.
Calculation on the desire of the Contractor to get into a large customer. It works when there are many artists on the market.
1. Faster, faster
The customer is in a hurry with the assessment and with his whole appearance that he will not find fault with the assessment.
The calculation goes to the fact that the Contractor does not take into account all the nuances and considers only the main work, laying the possible nuances in the risks (in the form of overstating the cost of work).
After receiving the assessment, the Customer asks to list the scope of work in more detail. With detailed painting, the overestimated cost of individual works becomes obvious, after which the Customer can only point this out and ask for a reduction in the cost of work. The contractor is forced to give the value of the declared work without taking into account possible risks.
In this case, the Customer shifts the risks of unplanned costs to the Contractor.
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2. Together-apart
The customer asks to calculate the work as a whole for several objects (companies, branches, sites).
The expectation that the Contractor will try to save labor costs while performing the same type of work. After receiving the estimate, the Customer asks for separate estimates for each object. Although individual projects increase costs, the Contractor is forced to give estimates with the initial total cost.
In this case, the Customer assigns the Contractor’s savings resulting from the simultaneous performance of work of the same type.
3. Wearing out
The customer changes the initial data several times, each time requesting the control and the TT.
The expectation is that at some point the Contractor will get tired of preparing options and agree to conditions that are less favorable to him. Here several factors play into the hands of the Customer at once:
a) Customer's costs for changing the original data are significantly less than the labor and time costs of the Contractor for the preparation of a new proposal.
b) from the Contractor, one or two people, as a rule, work on the proposal; from the Customer, much more people can work on changing the source data. At the same time, the Customer’s people can work on separate parts of the Proposal, while the Contractor has to coordinate each change with all related parts.
c) When changing the cost of the project, the contractor is forced to renegotiate the proposal with his management each time, risking incitement after several iterations. The customer does not agree with the change of initial data with anyone.
In this case, the Customer transfers part of the costs to the Contractor, taking advantage of the Contractor’s lack of resources (time, labor, management loyalty) to assess the additional costs incurred.
Two more tricks, very primitive and even obvious, nevertheless used almost everywhere:
4. The buried elephant
The customer hides the hard work in the list of simple works. For example, when discussing the protection system of the virtualization environment, most of the time will be devoted to information security tools, and only in passing will be mentioned the deployment of the target information system, which is waiting for the Contractor to deploy the server subsystem, storage system, virtualization environment and terminal access system.
The expectation that the Contractor will announce the assessment before recognizes the size of the elephant. Refusing the stated assessment is fraught with loss of reputation, on which the customer plays.
5. Bright future
The customer pushes at the price and at the same time (sometimes implicitly) promises further cooperation on the results of the project. Often the Contractor is pressed through the works and delivery at a loss.
Calculation on the desire of the Contractor to get into a large customer. It works when there are many artists on the market.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/290802/
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