Fair and simple
We welcome customers at our training centre on public and private courses. If they ask us to present our courses at their offices, we're very happy to do so, but we do charge them the additional expense this puts us to - basically travel and accommodation. Naturally, they want a fixed price quote for this ahead of time (no-one likes placing an order for an "open" amount), and for a number of years we've operated a scheme based on travel at x p per mile and overnight expenses at y pounds per night I'm staying away.
It's a simple scheme, and it averages out so that the money we charge is usually about the same as the expenses - in other words, we don't look to make any profit on it. Fair? Well - it was fair 2 or 3 years ago, but hotel prices in London have been creeping up, car parking there is expensive, and there's also the congestion charge. And that means that our scheme has become less fair - it means that if we raise expenses across the board, our "provincial" customers will be subsidising our "capital" ones.
So - a moral dilemma - keep it simple, or sacrifice some simplicity to keep it fair.
All London courses confirmed after 1st January 2005 will be subject to a higher "overnight" expense charge - an extra 30 pounds per day - and our non-London course prices (and expenses) will remain unaltered.
Worked Example - Visit the web site of a typical hotel chain - I'm in London at a Travel Inn this week (King's Cross) at 83 pounds per night; I was at their Nuneaton hotel a fortnight ago, and there the charge was just 46 pounds per night. I can park, eat and pay for internet / phone on the change from 95 pounds in Nuneaton, but not in London. (written 2004-11-17, updated 2008-05-11)
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[77] Telephone systems - (2004-10-07)
[88] Getting the right level of trainer - (2004-10-14)
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[108] A typical morning - (2004-11-03)
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[129] Trawling our site to prevent student copying - (2004-11-24)
[137] Certification schemes - (2004-12-02)
[157] Automatic service upgrades - (2004-12-19)
[180] Skunk works - (2005-01-17)
[188] Pink elephant and appreciation - (2005-01-24)
[200] Tips for the top - (2005-02-03)
[211] Look after your staff and they'll look after you. AOL. - (2005-02-12)
[217] Use of time - (2005-02-16)
[226] Growing our systems - (2005-02-24)
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[321] Sales - the alternative close - (2005-05-23)
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[766] Discounts and approved supplier lists - (2006-06-17)
[808] Sales call - (2006-07-19)
[849] Staff Meeting - (2006-08-30)
[869] UNABLE TO ATTEND - (2006-09-16)
[883] Age discrimination law - (2006-10-01)
[906] A commitment we won't be making - (2006-10-27)
[1057] Selling by phone and Skype - our policy - (2007-01-30)
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[1157] Speed Networking - a great evening and how we arranged it - (2007-04-21)
[1165] Extended Credit request - train in June and be paid in September - (2007-04-27)
[1243] Heavy duty hole punch - (2007-06-24)
[1260] An inspirational business talk from one of our prospective MPs - (2007-07-06)
[1263] 0800 043 8225 - a new phone number for Well House - (2007-07-10)
[1319] Customer feedback - lifeblood of a business - (2007-08-25)
[1342] Google, wwmdirectory, Freshwater, ATP - new scam? - (2007-09-09)
[1373] New Month, New Quarter, New Laws - (2007-10-01)
[1394] Business to Business Networking - North and West Wilts / Melksham - (2007-10-17)
[1453] What makes our courses special? - (2007-12-02)
[1485] Copyright and theft of images, bandwidth and members. - (2007-12-26)
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[1713] Ways to accept credit cards - or not! - (2008-07-19)
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[1913] Alastair Darling helps make paperwork and confusion - (2008-11-30)
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[4293] Certification - (2014-09-15)
[4415] Buffet review - taking the price into account - (2015-02-05)
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