Buying for Business

The place I work for isn't quite big enough yet to have a "purchasing" department, or even individual for that matter... as such, I end up buying some of the things we need with my credit card and getting reimbursed afterwards. I can do this because they know they can trust me to be frugal, and I know that they have every incentive to keep me happy come credit card bill time (their lone server guy walking out on them would qualify as Bad).

In the process, I've come across something that, in this day and age, amazes me... companies that don't openly advertise their pricing for goods and services. They expect you to contact one of their sales representatives to get a quote on what you need... even if what they offer is substantially similar to their peers. Today's item for discussion: phone and internet service.

In consumer-land, phone companies and cable companies have product details, base pricing, and any special promotional offers readily available through their website. Turn to the business side of things... and pricing suddenly disappears behind the curtain, to be revealed only through contact with your personal intermediaries to the phone company pantheon.

What's my point? In any given market, there are a very limited number of players for this service... do they really think that any business that would take the time to research pricing online isn't going to put in for quotes with multiple vendors? What should be a simple matter, able to be researched over the course of an afternoon, instead drags out into a multi-day process whose sole purpose seems to be the lining of sales weasels' pockets.

If any phone company rep stumbles across this, you should know: in other product/service lines, I purposely avoid dealing with companies that use this tactic, precisely because the gain isn't worth the pain. If one of your competitors opens up their pricing to the outside world, I might do my current provider the courtesy of requesting a quote at the end of my contract... but that's it.