Business gifts are common at this time of the year. What is their purpose? I had the earliest experience of them because of my father’s job as an architect. Gifts ranged from a large tin of Smiths Crisps (he did most of the design work for Smith’s local factory) to hams, turkeys, chocolates, bottles of spirits, carets of beer, packs of cigarettes and boxes of cigars from various other clients.
This was relatively small stuff compared to, say the gratifications a chain store buyer negotiating a supply contract in the Far East might enjoy, or an arms dealer buying his way into a contract from a foreign government might disburse. Yet twenty years on I found myself in a similar position and, like my father, I found the situation uncomfortable; were these gifts or bribes? Like him, I tried to assuage my conscience by giving most of the stuff away to my staff, although they would have been on the rake from the same donors, if at a lower rate, as would my superiors, at a higher rate. I drowned my scruples in what was left.
My own ethical system was obviously unsophisticated but, if these were bribes, what should I have done about them? Refusing them might cause offence. It might not even be understood. A more upright colleague wrote a snooty letter to a contractor asking him to remove a haul of miscellaneous Christmas items. The contractor thought he had realised his mistake, and sent a wad of banknotes instead.
There is surely no difference morally between the offer of goods or of cash. I am glad that I am no longer subject to the temptation, and from the attendant protests from that pesky built-in knowledge that causes us to know right from wrong, and to know we should do right.
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What is their purpose? Clearly they are a bribe. The Bribery Act has done away with most of them, I think.
Cases of Fortnum's champagne used to arrive for us at my current employer from a French law firm. They have stopped.
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Not a new problem.
Back in the late 1940s my father, who was involved with buying all types of "paper" goods of all types for a major store used to get such "gifts"
The other items I recall were fantastic glossy wall calendars. We had so many they were distributed to friends who were very impressed in those austere days.
On the jolly note. In those days of paper chains, we had some of the best in the land. They were cut from the large sample books of expensive wall paper brought from the office.
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>>What is their purpose? Clearly they are a bribe.
Mostly I don't think they are.
Account Managers are successful by building a relationship with their customer. And if you have a relationship with someone, then you'd buy them a drink at Christmas.
Very difficult to stop. And you'll never stop the actually dishonest or potentially swayed, that will just continue underground.
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The fundamental point to me is whether the gifts precede the service or not.
If you would have rendered the service anyway, at the agreed price, and then later a surprise gift arrives, that's surely just goodwill, not bribery.
But if tenders are in but not awarded yet, and then you get a gift, that's bribery.
I agree you could perhaps stretch the process over time, and say that this year's goodwill gift is a bribe in advance for next year. But then there's that element in any payment. You may give the waiter a good tip for his service this time, but he will remember you next time - is it then a bribe?
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I have a task that has to be outsourced. We have two suppliers either of which will do the job equally well. One I know (or at least presume) will send me a case of champagne at Christmas. The other I know will not.
I've never actually met the individuals; they're both perfectly nice on the phone. But one of them sends me champagne at Christmas.
Which one gets the job?
It's probably even worse if - as is customary - the champagne is shared out evenly among the team, secretaries included, then to choose the wrong supplier prejudices the presents for the junior members. At that point it's no just longer my relationship with the other party; it's the happiness of the rest of the team at stake, so perhaps the purveyor of bubbles gets it when he shouldn't.
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My employer - and most others, I hope - offers a clear guideline on business gifts. No cash or equivalents, nominal value only (I have quite a lot of branded pens and mugs, but no cases of champagne) and not offered, promised or received to influence or reward decision making. Anything I want to give (not that I generally do) has to be approved two levels up.
Easy for me; my customers are mostly in Europe and have similar policies of their own. My colleagues in, say, Russia or parts of Asia may have more to contend with in terms of local practices.
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>>>Mostly I don't think they are.
Very much agree.
Before I left employment to do my own thing (almost 20yrs ago) those in my position would receive a bottle of spirits from our three main contractors and wine/spirits from perhaps half a dozen of our biggest customers.
It was routine in our business and a tiny but nice gesture compared to the value of invoices we signed off over the period of a year. Getting a contractor to tarmac your drive FOC in return for signing off an invoice for £10k extras on a job is a bribe. A £10 bottle at Christmas isn't.
There was never any guilt or feeling of obligation on my part as those who offered the gifts knew damn well my dealings with them would be 100% above board gift or no gift.
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>>The fundamental point to me is whether the gifts precede the service or not.
Really? I couldn't care less about the timing, its easy to delay a "present" in any case.
The fundamental point for me would be whether the gifts influenced the decision or not.
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>> The fundamental point for me would be whether the gifts influenced the decision or not.
>>
I agree. I was trying to express that by reference to the timing.
But timing is how others will judge your actions, which is just as important as how you judge them yourself.
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Here's another view for you...(and its true).
I was negotiating a contract in South America where I was on the selling side. The price was around $20m US (about £12m now).
The person in charge of awarding the contract let me know that he would award me the contract but he wanted a car and a holiday in Florida with his family.
The car would have been around $35k and the holiday around $15k - so about $50k.
On a $20m deal I would drop $500k on price without thinking about it. I'd probably have been prepared to drop a million or so if push came to shove.
So, bribing him would be financially very sensible for me and my company although morally wrong.
Once bribed, they stay bribed. Otherwise they'd never get bribed again.
Going to his boss will get the original guy as your enemy, and you'd very probably end up with the boss asking you for a bribe anyway. If not, then he's just going to give the contract to someone else to prove he's not biased towards you (and he'll take a bribe from them, anyway), and procurement people will in the future refuse to deal with you.
ditto the police.
So, $50k for a $20m contract or would your morality stop you and cause you to lose $40m for your company and about $500k commission in your own pocket.
I know what I did, what would you do?
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I come across this problem dealing in Middle East and would rather lose a contract than be involved in such practices...
.....you only have one reputation.... and like virginity , once it is gone it is gone......
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BAE and Saudi Plane contracts.
Need I say more?
I worked in construction. We had a policy: bribes never given nor received. Nor gifts.
Once it was known it tended to be accepted...
Last edited by: madf on Tue 17 Dec 13 at 16:16
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"I know what I did, what would you do?"
I'd do EXACTLY the same as you did, Mark.
Last edited by: Robin O'Reliant on Tue 17 Dec 13 at 16:16
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>>
>> I know what I did, what would you do?
>>
Resign and work somewhere I wouldn't be put in that position.
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I am intrigued as to what Robin believes I did.
Resigning is an option, it will certainly ensure you'll not be "put" in that position again, because you'll never be offered another opportunity. And in reality you are not "put". One would assume that you have taken the contract with your eyes open and knew what you may face.
Equally one is employed to manage these situations, not to run away when it gets tough. Having accepted the challenge of the role, one does then need to execute it.
And losing a contract rather than being involved is certainly a possibility. However, the company *needs* the contract, this is what they do and how they survive and how they pay loads of people a wage. And I had been recruited to do the best for the company, the shareholders and their staff. And in this case the "best" was to win this contract.
And madf, construction and *no* bribes? I hope whatever your job was it didn't need good eyesight. I have known of several, *first* hand, and in the UK. I also had an involvement in Ghana and in East Timor, both with UK companies. And with a British construction equipment supplier in Eastern Europe.
You do indeed have one reputation and only one; it is difficult to decide whether that reputation should be getting companies through difficult situations or standing by your own belief system to the detriment of your employers. [I am not being facetious, I do mean that it is a difficult decision].
I assure you all, that this is a very difficult situation to face which goes far beyond, and is far more complex than, considerations of your own personal morality.
I'd like to know what R o'R thinks I did, and then I'll say honestly what I did do.
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'Because I have bunged you a small piece of kitchen electrical equipment made for some brand or other in one of our numerous plants, you will of course sign our hugely inflated ten-year supply and maintenance contract for (guided missiles or whatever) without reading the small print' ... is this what people really think happens? Do me a favour. That's just a small kindness and token of appreciation. 'Stuff' is free to big businessmen, and they assume everyone thinks like that. It's just sort of courtesy.
I have spent time in places where bribes and bungs are more or less a way of life. You have to have grown up with it to know the ropes really. I am pretty hopeless at it. People, or some of them, tolerated me politely in Lagos but no one mistook me for a proper gent. I was always recognised as a crass Oyigbo deep down.
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Much of selling is understanding what motivates the person making the decision. This one has told us he wants a car and a holiday - clearly something we can't offer directly. But how does he stand to benefit if a successful negotiation with us makes him look good to his bosses? Some of a $500,000 saving might come his way as a bonus, without any impropriety on either side. It might not be that simple, but I'd expect to find something if my interpersonal skills were up to understanding him properly.
And if I did that, and lost out to a competitor who simply paid the bribe, I think I'd still feel better than if I'd just paid up. Corruption wrecks whole countries and I wouldn't want to be part of it.
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>> I'd like to know what R o'R thinks I did, and then I'll say honestly
>> what I did do.
>>
>>
>>
Right, first off that post should have had a smiley!
However, being serious I'd have sum with the tide. If expecting a bung is common practice in that part of the world I'd have given the sweetner rather than lose the contract. You could take the moral high ground and walk away, but then you'd be out on your ear because your job is to make things work and someone else would have stepped in and taken it anyway.
If my morals were of a high enough order to find such a thing repugnant I'd have resigned and found another line of business. Now you're not a crook or a dishonest man, but you know how the world works and I believe you did what I'd have done.
With sincere apologies if I'm wrong.
Last edited by: Robin O'Reliant on Tue 17 Dec 13 at 17:16
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>>With sincere apologies if I'm wrong.
Mostly not wrong.
It is not an easy thing to "bung", since there are the two warring feelings of immorality versus getting things done.
And, as I said, if he'd said I'll give you the contract for a $1m discount, I'd almost certainly have sad yes, and a $50k bung is vastly less than that.
Part of why I'm given this stuff to do is firstly that I can relied upon to find a way through the mess, I will achieve what the company wants and will not expose anyone to unwarranted risk.
So in this case I sent him on a "reference" trip to visit a similar client in the US so he could "check" on our capabilities, and I paid for his family to go with him since as the trip was going to take 3 weeks, a meeting on day 1 and then a meeting on day 24ish, it was unreasonable to expect him to lose his annual holiday with his wife and kids.
Equally, we had a car we needed looked after and he kindly offered to do so.
I guess we forgot to ask for the car back and it was hardly his fault that his US meetings were cancelled.
Its a balance that worked for me. I stopped short of writing him a check because of the legal risk to the company and because it was a step too far for me.
Nonetheless I did give him benefits which out and out influenced his decision which by any standards is inappropriate.
I didn't feel guilty towards his company because I felt, and as was subsequently proved, we'd do a good job for them and the contract price was reasonable if not actually cheap.
I got my company their contract, and if it went wrong there'd have been little more than slapped wrists for unwise behaviour. It didn't go wrong.
No doubt you would all have done better than I.
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>> No doubt you would all have done better than I.
>>
In my case I wouldn't have been as clever as you and maybe ended up in clink if it all went pear shaped.
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>>Resign and work somewhere I wouldn't be put in that position.
About 10 years ago I was stopped for speeding just outside Bogota in Columbia. And I most certainly was speeding quite considerably.
The policeman was corrupt and $20 US made it all go away.
Would you have insisted on paying the more official $400 in court and, as you were a foreigner, having the car impounded until the case was heard?
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The rules in the Civil Service were pretty clear. No gifts should be accepted but with an exception for seasonal items being low value products such as calenders etc. Somebody expressed that in terms of a bottle of wine being acceptable while a case was not. There was also something about normal business hospitality which allowed us to have coffee or sandwiches 'on the house' while checking out venues for conferences etc.
Everything had to be recorded in a 'gifts and hospitality register' subject to publication.
I've had cause for 'words' with junior member of staff who seemed to favour a stationery supplier who gave incentives such a chocolates and cheap CD players.
One member of a Quango with which I served had, as a young man, been on the scene when John Poulson's corrupt gifts to George Pottinger came to light. His mimic of the 'gobsmacked' reaction of Pottinger's superior was a bit of a party piece.
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Because of bribery legislation, we've had mandatory online courses at work twice this year so we can say we're all aware of bribery and corruption issues. So in the UK that's approx 10k of us having to take the time to do this.
Last edited by: rtj70 on Tue 17 Dec 13 at 21:05
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Me too - that's how I knew where to look for the words I quoted earlier. Also, if someone says, "Let's just do it this once," or "Nobody else will ever know," that's apparently a bad sign.
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>> I've had cause for 'words' with junior member of staff who seemed to favour a
>> stationery supplier who gave incentives such a chocolates and cheap CD players.
I made the control room staff give back the coffee maker they'd asked the local 'boarding up' company to provide them...keyrings, mugs etc..yes...anything more...no.
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Brompton, last year I was at a conference on Gift Aid where two folks from HMRC were there giving presentations.
The usual hotel type conference - they refused to even have as much as a coffee the whole day never mind being tempted by the help yourself buffet.
I believe they said it was easier to do it that way from their viewpoint.
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I sometimes have to work with people appointed by one Competition Authority or another, or one regulator or another, to oversee a merger.
The embarrassment of working out a lunch bill to the penny is awful, but they will not take or give anything. Not even "I buy today and you buy tomorrow". Everything, to the penny.
As Bobby says, they maintain its just easier.
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In the days when I was a finance house rep & manager, I used to utterly dread taking out motor dealers for lunch or drinks.
Our company used to have (very) wet & free bars at motor & boat show stands and the behaviour of the sponging gannets who descended on the stand was pretty horrid.
Happily (!) a drunken visitor insulted the wife of the M.D. and all show stands reverted to tea and biscuits afterwards.
Being Harrow based, we always caught stand duty at these shows. Dreadful business.
Our company used to give out high quality blotters, diaries, letter openers and such, at Christmas and these were actually much sought after.
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>> "Do as I say not as I do". Private Eye has run lots on this
>> ex-HMRC guy, now with HSBC I believe.
>>
>> www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/7833886/Whitehalls-most-wined-and-dined-civil-servant-is-HMRCs-Dave-Hartnett.html
>>
And then Goldman Sachs get a super duper tax deal as do Amazon..
I wonder why?
:-((((((
Last edited by: madf on Wed 18 Dec 13 at 09:50
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Same as a lot of places, one rule for the troops and another for the top floor.
In my last job, pre-bribery act, there was a code of conduct. Anything beyond desk toys/lunch, typically corporate hostility things like a day at the British GP, required permission from above and had to be written in the "bung book" with a value. Any valuable hospitality antecedent to contracts had to be declined.
I did some stuff in Italy about ten years ago and (unsolicited) presents were more common. On my last visit before Christmas a contractor presented me with 24 bottles of fairly serious wine. I might have refused it there and then, but they were left in reception and he'd gone. I brought a bottle home and left the rest for the staff there.
Many years ago I used to deal with a builder's merchant. He told me that, before the local authority reorganisations, his contact at the works department of the local town council would routinely let him know just before the end of the financial year what he wanted, where to deliver it, and what to invoice the council with (not necessarily what had been supplied, which on one occasion was a new caravan).
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In the 60's and 70's I was employed as sub contract buyer for various large civil engineering outfits and the Christmas booze would be by the crate rather than the odd bottle, 5 hour lunches were not unknown and it was accepted practice....nobody cared...
I learned a valuable lesson though when I once was invited to a box at the Oval Test Match as a guest of a major construction company as a thank you for buying their prestressed concrete beams for a multi storey car park.....and as it happened play was rained off so lunch was taken early and as the lunch progressed a lot of drink was taken..... I could normally handle my booze but combined with the antibiotics I was taking I remember nothing of the day between 1 pm and waking up in a toilet cubicle at 9 pm.....minus my jacket....
I managed to find my way out of the ground past the cleaners and ground staff clearing up, onto the train and as it was still raining I staggered home at Midnight looking like an inebriated drowned rat....
As we were due to set off to drive to Sheffield at 5 am the next day ......I was still over the limit and ' under the weather 'and SWMBO had to drive all the way..... suffice it to say she was not amused.
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Take my word on it - Tia Maria and Champagne cocktails bought by a villainous motor
caravan dealer can do that for you, too!
I drove home!
(Before breathalysers and before common sense!)
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The motor trade I was afflicted (they were horrible) with had a fascination with Sambuca (yuk), so Tia Maria sounds quite believable.
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>>I learned a valuable lesson...
Similar, except it was Twickenham and I was so drunk I slept on a bench somewhere within a mile or two of the ground.
It never happened again makes me blush just thinking about it.
As I advise people, at the very least make sure you drink one drink less than everybody around you and go to bed 1 hour earlier than they do.
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>> Similar, except it was Twickenham and I was so drunk I slept on a bench
>> somewhere within a mile or two of the ground.
Twickenham? Ah. My accommodation of choice was under a hedge on the roundabout on the A316 outside Currie Motors.
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Nice people to do business with.
I was down some side road. I've never truly worked out where it was despite hundreds of trips to Twickers since then.
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>> I've never truly worked out where it was despite hundreds of trips to Twickers since then.
Places look so different when you're cross-eyed.
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"cross-eyed" would have been about 12 steps up the eyesight effectiveness scale from where I was.
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Ah, that legendary condition 'blind drunk' perhaps.
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I slept in the back of a Reliant Regal once. It wasn't mine, in fact I've no idea who owned it.
But it was parked on the Caversham Road and the back was unlocked and home seemed a very long way.
Last edited by: No FM2R on Wed 18 Dec 13 at 14:37
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Supervan, I presume? The saloons didn't have back doors.
Dad had several, vans and saloons. Putting off getting a driving licence, see. Drove them on his motorbike licence. Nagging from mother finally made him snap and we got a MkII Cortina estate.
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It was a van; kind of a beige, baby-poo brown colour. And who ever owned it didn't keep it very clean inside.
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>> kind of a beige, baby-poo brown colour.
That reminds me that once, lost at night in the wilds of East Anglia, I slept in a farm trailer that in the morning turned out to be a dung-cart caked with the dried commodity.
However others who have ventured out of town a few times will confirm that dried cattle manure is very inoffensive stuff, sweet-smelling even.
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>>
>> However others who have ventured out of town a few times will confirm that dried
>> cattle manure is very inoffensive stuff, sweet-smelling even.
>>
Yes.
We sued to smoke it as very young teenagers!
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>> It was a van; kind of a beige, baby-poo brown colour.
One of my Dad's fits that description perfectly.
>> And who ever owned
>> it didn't keep it very clean inside.
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Ah. Not ours then. My Mum's got a photo of me aged about 5 sitting on the bonnet. I'll try to scan it in next time I'm down there.
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>>One of my Dad's fits that description perfectly.
Off road, outside a newsagents, just along from the Standard Tandoori.
Before your [Reading] time though, I think.
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>> Before your [Reading] time though, I think.
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Aye. I've only moved to Reading since leaving home, Dad's van wouldn't have been anywhere near Reading at night time.
Standard Tandoori is still going. Has more competition these days. But the Standard Super Dry Fry is still the best curry in town.
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Dad's van wouldn't have been anywhere near Reading at night time.
Nor me. Don't fancy it much in daylight for that matter.
};---)
Incidentally, we had a letter the other week from Beestling Minor's school, announcing that he'd been selected by the head for 'advanced Reading'. I'm hoping he'll be able to help me after that; I've never really mastered basic Reading.
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>> Incidentally, we had a letter the other week from Beestling Minor's school, announcing that he'd
>> been selected by the head for 'advanced Reading'.
I expect that involves all the one-way systems, and finding your way out of the Purple Turtle at 3am and remembering where the hell you are.
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Stop it. You're scaring me. Not big, not clever, not nice.
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>> Supervan, I presume? The saloons didn't have back doors.
>>
>>
My first car, one of them. They had a surprising amount of room in them enabling some vigorous Ugandan Discussions to take place from time to time.
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>>one rule for the troops and another for the top floor.
It certainly is true that all the anti bad-behaviour training is aimed at people who probably wouldn't do it anyway, but even if they did it wouldn't be serious money.
Whereas the people with the potential and the freedom to do harm are largely disregarded.
Having said that I used to do some work on occasion for a Borough Council in the UK in the early 80s. The corruption in their "Works" department, and the collusion of management, was astounding. And it was almost regulated as to how big the bungs should be, what the processes used should be etc. etc.
I did hear that they had a big furor and clean out including dismissals and prosecutions, I often wonder if they stopped it permanently.
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Another much more sad tale of accepting company hospitality ...
At one company I worked for two colleagues were invited to the Open at Troon by a supplier ... both were keenly anticipating a great weekend.
One travelled on the Friday to meet the suppliers Sales Manager and the other was disappointed that he could not travel on the Friday but flew to Edinburgh on the Saturday expecting to be collected by them.......
The Saturday morning collection alas never happened .....
.. both the Sales Manager and the first colleague who travelled up on Friday died in a head on collision with a lorry at 5 am on the Saturday morning....my other colleague spent his Saturday afternoon not watching the golf but identifying bodies in a mortuary........
It was never proved whether drink was a factor in the accident but it does seem likely.....
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'Tis the season to be jolly careful. - Mapmaker
