Price the Work Your Supplier Commission Does Not Cover

Free service is still a service decision

Technology advisors are good at adding value around a transaction. We help the client organize requirements, compare suppliers, manage the order, chase updates, explain bills, and clean up problems after the signature.

That work can separate a strong advisor from somebody who forwards quotes. It can also quietly turn a healthy commission into months of unpaid delivery.

The mistake is not doing extra work. Sometimes the extra work protects the relationship and earns the next opportunity. The mistake is never deciding which work belongs in the relationship, how much the firm can support, or when the scope needs a separate fee.

If your answer is always "we take care of it," your team hears unlimited scope. Your client may hear the same thing.

Separate transaction work from firm-owned service

Start by listing the work your firm performs before, during, and after a supplier decision. Do not use vague categories such as account management. Write down the actual work.

• Discovery, requirements, supplier research, quote comparison, and recommendation
• Order coordination, implementation meetings, status updates, testing, and issue tracking
• Invoice review, contract inventory, usage reporting, executive reviews, and renewal planning
• Moves, adds, changes, service tickets, supplier escalations, and documentation requests
• Technology roadmaps, budget support, policy work, project leadership, and ongoing advisory access

Then ask who controls the work and who receives the deliverable. A supplier may own installation while your firm coordinates communication. A client may expect your team to manage a project plan that no supplier agreed to own. Those are different responsibilities, even if they happen during the same deal.

Connect the inventory to your client lifecycle. You should be able to see where each service begins, what closes it, and who owns the next action.

Put every service in one of four buckets

You do not need twenty service packages. You need a decision for each repeatable activity.

• Included: The work is part of the standard advisor relationship. Define the normal trigger, deliverable, and reasonable limit.
• Limited: The work is included up to a clear boundary, such as a meeting cadence, number of locations, project phase, or response window.
• Paid: The work requires a separate project fee, recurring advisory fee, or another written commercial agreement.
• Declined or referred: The work sits outside your model, capability, insurance, authority, or available capacity.

"Included" cannot mean unlimited. If your firm includes quarterly reviews, say what the review covers and what preparation is expected from the client. If implementation coordination is included, define whether you are tracking supplier commitments or acting as the client's project manager.

Those sentences matter. A client should not have to discover the boundary when a project is already late.

Calculate the delivery cost before choosing a price

Supplier-paid revenue and client-paid service revenue can sit beside each other, but they should not be mixed into one optimistic number. Your advisor revenue forecast should show the source, timing, and confidence of each revenue line.

For each service, estimate the delivery effort by role. Include preparation, meetings, follow-up, documentation, supervision, and the work created by exceptions. Add direct tools or outside resources. Then add the founder review that everybody forgets because it happens between calls.

A simple worksheet needs these fields:

• Service and promised deliverable
• Trigger, frequency, and expected volume
• Owner and reviewer
• Estimated hours by role
• Direct delivery cost
• Expected supplier revenue connected to the relationship
• Client fee, if any
• Scope limit and exception rule

This is not an excuse to assign an hourly price to every email. It is a way to stop pretending labor is free because the client does not receive an invoice for it.

Choose a pricing model that matches the work

Use a fixed project fee when the deliverable and finish line are clear. A migration plan, inventory cleanup, assessment, or defined implementation leadership assignment can fit here. The agreement should name assumptions, client responsibilities, change control, and acceptance evidence.

Use a recurring fee when the client receives continuing access or a repeated operating service. That may include scheduled reviews, reporting, contract administration, roadmap support, or a defined support layer. The cadence and response boundaries should be visible.

Use an included service when it makes the core transaction easier to buy and support, the cost is understood, and the relationship economics can carry it. Keep the boundary in writing anyway.

Do not choose the model because it is fashionable. Choose it based on how the work arrives. A fixed fee breaks when the finish line keeps moving. A recurring fee frustrates a client when no recurring value is visible. Hourly billing can fit unpredictable advisory work, but it still needs authority and reporting controls.

Do not hide compensation from the client

Supplier compensation and a client service fee can coexist. Confusion is the problem.

Explain which party pays for what, what service the client receives, where your advisory role ends, and whether supplier compensation affects the client's price under the applicable arrangement. Use your actual agreements and legal guidance where needed. Do not improvise a disclosure after the client asks.

The service agreement should also identify work that belongs to the supplier, the client, or another provider. Your team can coordinate a supplier issue without accepting responsibility for the supplier's performance.

This is also where your supplier escalation process matters. Escalation support needs an owner and a communication rule. It should not become a permanent substitute for unresolved supplier service.

Use exceptions to improve the package

Scope creep is usually visible before it becomes expensive. One client needs weekly meetings instead of quarterly reviews. Another keeps adding locations. A third asks your team to own tasks that sat with its internal IT group during discovery.

Record the exception when it happens. Capture the client, service, request, estimated effort, owner, decision, and commercial treatment. Then review repeated exceptions each month.

If several clients request the same useful work, you may have a service worth packaging. If one client consumes the same unplanned work every week, you may need a boundary conversation. If your founder must approve every exception, fix the delegation rule before adding more clients. The delegation playbook should define who can include small exceptions and who can change commercial scope.

Audit five client relationships this week

Pick five clients with different revenue, complexity, and service patterns. Pull the last 90 days of meetings, tasks, projects, supplier issues, reports, and support requests. Mark each activity included, limited, paid, or declined.

Now compare the work with the revenue record. Do not ask only whether the account is profitable. Ask which promise created the work, whether the client understands the boundary, and whether another person could deliver the service without guessing.

Choose one fix per account. Write the scope. Add a limit. Price a project. Move the work to the right owner. Or stop offering something your firm cannot deliver well.

If the client record, project work, activities, contracts, and commissions live in separate systems, run the free Advisor OS agency scorecard. You cannot price service well when you cannot see the work around the revenue.