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The fee tendering and service quality issue revisited
No full textPurpose - It is a little over twenty years since mandatory fee scales were abolished by UK professional bodies. During this period fee levels have fluctuated with economic demand, and new procurement strategies such as partnering have been developed, but there is still a widespread view in industry, that fee levels are too low. This view is shared by many professionals, and perhaps more surprisingly by clients, even in the current construction and property boom. The research reported in this paper investigates the link between competitive fee tendering and clients’ perceptions of service quality in the UK Property Industry. The main hypothesis is that there is a causal relationship between service quality and the method of appointment of the professional. Design/methodology/approach - The research involved unstructured interviews with clients and professionals and a postal questionnaire study of one hundred and thirty three UK based clients. The questionnaire study was a repeat of a similar survey conducted eight years previously in very different economic conditions. The public and private sector clients each assessed the service quality received from a professional using a measurement scale developed from the generic service industry instrument SERVQUAL. The scale is used to test the main hypothesis and four sub-hypotheses. There were twice as many private sector clients completing the questionnaires as there were public sector clients and the largest group of professionals assessed were General Practice Chartered Surveyors. Findings - The results of the recent study are similar to the earlier one (in that evidence of the predicted relationship is not provided by the data) but there are some interesting differences in the results of both studies – fee tendering has declined in popularity, direct appointment has increased, but less than 5% of the commissions were let on a partnered basis. Practical implications – Property managers and other professionals
AUDIT FEE ECONOMETRICAL MODELS AN OVERVIEW OF THE AUDITING RESEARCH LITERATURE
No full textOur research intends to present a literature review on studies regarding theaudit fee and its cost behavioral in relation to the audit process. The purpose of the paperis to enhance and synthesize the main results of auditing research literature impendingaudit fee approximation. Hence, our analysis requires a literature review methodology.We start by introducing the concept of audit fee; the first part of the paper follows the shifttaking place in the cost behavior of audit in a diachronic study methodology. The main partof the paper discusses empirical studies on audit fee by closely analyzing their researchdesign, the employed research methodology and the obtained results. The originality of thestudy, its contribution relies in a consisting and comprehensive overview on papers inauditing research literature that presents audit fee through an empirical approach. Whenin comes to the importance and reliability of such studies further impacts upon therelevance of their results and how they can be used.audit fee, empirical research, econometric model, research literature
Health worker perspectives on user fee removal in Zambia.
No full textBACKGROUND: User fees for primary care services were removed in rural districts in Zambia in 2006. Experience from other countries has suggested that health workers play a key role in determining the success of a fee removal policy, but also find the implementation of such a policy challenging. The policy was introduced against a backdrop of a major shortage in qualified health staff. METHODS: As part of a larger study on the experience and effect of user fee removal in Zambia, a number of case studies at the facility level were conducted. As part of these, quantitative and qualitative data were collected to evaluate health workers' satisfaction and experiences in charging and non-charging facilities. RESULTS: Our findings show that health-care workers have mixed feelings about the policy change and its consequences. We found some evidence that personnel motivation was higher in non-charging facilities compared to facilities still charging. Yet it is unclear whether this effect was due to differences in the user fee policy or to the fact that a lot of staff interviewed in non-charging facilities were working in mission facilities, where we found a significantly higher motivation. Health workers expressed satisfaction with an apparent increase in the number of patients visiting the facilities and the removal of a deterring factor for many needy patients, but also complained about an increased workload. Furthermore, working conditions were said to have worsened, which staff felt was linked to the absence of additional resources to deal with the increased demand or replace the loss of revenue generated by fees. CONCLUSION: These findings highlight the need to pay attention to supply-side measures when removing demand-side barriers such as user fees and in particular to be concerned about the burden that increased demand can place on already over-stretched health workers
Insider patent holder licensing in an oligopoly market with different cost structures: Fixed-fee, royalty, and auction
No full textThe issue of the optimal licensing contract in firms having different cost structures is studied when the innovator is a producing patent holder who has three alternative licensing strategies, namely, the fixed-fee, royalty rate, and auction strategies. We conclude that the auction licensing strategy is not the best strategy when the innovator is a producing patent holder. This finding differs from that of Kabiraj (2004) where the auction licensing method is the optimal licensing strategy when the innovator is a non-producing patent holder. However, when we only compare two of the licensing methods, namely, the fixed-fee licensing method and the royalty licensing method, we conclude that if the inside innovator licenses to only some of the firms, then the royalty licensing method will be the best strategy. This result is different from that of Fosfuri and Roca (2004), who concluded that if only some of the licensees obtain a licensing contract, then the fixed-fee licensing method will be the best choice for a producing patent holder.Licensing strategy, Cost structure, Auction
The effect of reimbursement fee changes on service production for laboratory tests in Norwegian primary health care
No full textThis paper examines how changes in reimbursement fees influence the service production of laboratory tests among Norwegian primary care physicians. The data represent a panel of 2,083 physicians paid on a fee-for-service basis for the period 2001–04. We construct a variable that measures the exogenous effect of changes in reimbursement fees on physician income. We measure service production by the number of laboratory tests per consultation, the relative change in the composition of laboratory tests, and the number of tests per consultation ordered from clinical laboratories. There are three main findings. First, physicians reduce the number of laboratory tests per consultation when fees decrease. Second, physicians change the composition of laboratory tests to tests that are more expensive when fees decrease. Finally, there is a spillover effect to the specialist health care sector because physicians who experience an income loss for tests analysed at the office laboratory order more tests from clinical laboratories. The results imply that fee regulation may be a simple means of controlling government expenditure. However, it is important to note the change in composition along with the potential spillover effects to other parts of the health care sector to obtain a complete picture of the influence of fee regulation on physician behaviourPhysician reimbursement; laboratory tests; financial incentives; income effect; substitution effect
The Relation Between Managed Care Market Share and the Treatment of Elderly Fee-For-Service Patients with Myocardial Infarction
No full textManaged care may affect medical treatments for non-managed-care patients if it alters local market structure or physician behavior. We investigate whether higher levels of overall managed care market share are associated with greater use of recommended therapies for fee-for-service patients with acute myocardial infarction using data on 112,900 fee-for-service Medicare beneficiaries residing in one of 320 metropolitan statistical areas, with age >= 65 years, and admitted with an acute myocardial infarction between February 1994 and July 1995 from the Cooperative Cardiovascular Project. After adjustment for patient characteristics, severity of illness, characteristics of the hospital of admission, specialty of treating physicians, and other area characteristics, patients treated in areas with high levels of managed care had greater relative use of beta-blockers during hospitalization and at discharge and aspirin during hospitalization and at discharge, consistent with more appropriate care. Patients in high HMO areas may be less likely to receive angiography when compared to areas with low levels of managed care, although this result was only marginally significant. In unadjusted comparisons, patients in high HMO market share areas had lower 30 day mortality, but there were no differences in 30 day mortality when all of the control variables were included in the model. We conclude that managed care can have widespread effects on the treatment of patients and the quality of care they receive, even for patients not enrolled in managed care organizations.
Payment Card Network Pricing - A Theoretical Approach Analyzing the Relationship between Downstream Market Characteristics and the Merchant Usage Fee
No full textIn this thesis the model of a payment card network is constructed to explore the impact of downstream market characteristics (i.e., the market where merchants and consumers interact) on the merchant and the interchange fee, thereby extending the literature’s observations of payment systems. To accomplish this, three scenarios are analyzed: firstly, a unitary payment card network with merchants under Cournot quantity competition and, secondly, under Bertrand price competition respectively, as well as, thirdly, a multi-party payment card network with merchants under Cournot quantity competition. This study yields two significant results. Firstly, the merchant and the interchange fee are found decreasing in the consumer price elasticity, the level of product substitutability and the relative frequency of card usage. Secondly, regulating the interchange fee and the merchant fee respectively is found particularly useful since, in markets with less competition where consumers already face inefficiently high prices, the payment card fees will also tend to be higher. --Two-sided markets,Payment card networks,Platform pricing,Bertrand competition,Industrial Organization,Cournot competition
How do banks make money? the fallacies of fee income
No full textIn the first of two articles in this issue, the authors document the increasing importance of noninterest income at U.S. commercial banking companies and address two fundamental misunderstandings regarding this trend: the belief that fee-based activities provide more stable earnings than interest-based income and the belief that fee income flows chiefly from nontraditional, nonbanking activities.Income ; Money ; Payment systems
Inter-agency adoption: subsidy of the inter-agency fee
No full textWhen the plan for a “looked after” child is adoption, it is important to reduce unnecessary delay in the adoption process. One reason for delay is that local authorities (LAs) may not have prospective adopters who can meet a child’s needs amongst their “in-house” adopters (that is adopters the LA has recruited and approved).
Suitable adopters may be available through other LAs or voluntary adoption agencies (VAAs), but this comes with an associated inter-agency fee where the LAs responsible for the child must pay the adopters’ agency a minimum fee of £27,000 (costs are higher for sibling groups) in order to compensate for the cost of adopter recruitment, assessment and support. A reluctance to pay this fee may act as a barrier to inter-agency placements, affecting particularly those whose characteristics make them ‘harder to place’.
In response to these concerns, the government began subsidising the inter-agency fee for a fixed period for all children defined as ‘harder to place’ in July 2015, in order to encourage LAs to consider more inter-agency matches and potentially reduce waiting times for children. The groups of children considered within this initiative as ‘harder to place’ are those aged 5 or older, disabled children, children who need to be placed with one or more siblings, children with a black or minority ethnic background (BME) and children who have been waiting over 18 months from entry into care to placement. This intervention aimed to encourage more (and speedier) matches to be made across a wider range of agencies, and to foster the development of new partnerships between LAs and VAAs.
This study investigated how this subsidy of the inter-agency fee was working within the broader context of adoption family finding activities
Determinants and implications of fee changes in the hedge fund industry
No full textWe examine the determinants and consequences of changes in hedge fund fee structures. We show that fee changes are asymmetric with much greater incidence of fee increases compared to fee decreases. We find that managers of younger and smaller funds are more likely to increase fees after good performance. Investors view the fee increases following good performance as a signal of managerial ability only to be disappointed by their worse future performance. Taken together, these findings are consistent with opportunistic behavior of emerging fund managers in expropriating surplus from their investors. --
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