VO-BB - 20 YEARS OLD!

Living Culture · Posted: Sat Mar 27, 2010 9:47 am Post subject: Client Questionares

I just got a client asking me to fill out a Request For Proposal sheet. A lot of it is normal contract mumbo jumbo, but after that goes much further-FOUR pages of questions...

The length itself was not that annoying, but it includes Q's like:

How many years have you been trading?
What was your turnover in the twelve months to Dec 2009
What was your turnover in the twelve months to Dec 2008
What was your profit in the twelve months to Dec 2009
What was your profit in the twelve months to Dec 2008
What level of professional indemnity do you hold?
What level of public and product liability do you hold?

Some of these are willingly discussed with peers, but to a client, I'd think it went into the NOYFB realm.

Anybody else get these?
_________________
Mandarin Chinese Voiceovers & Localization
http://lcmsmedia.com
http://imagesbykenny.com/

Philip Banks · Posted: Sat Mar 27, 2010 10:33 am Post subject:

The response ought to be "Happy to oblige with the information requested on receipt of your answers to the same questions" but I suspect what you should do is delete and ignore.

How many years have you been trading? RELEVANT - Are you reliable?
What was your turnover in the twelve months to Dec 2009 - Not relevant as you will in effect be lending the client money by supplying work BEFORE pay.
What was your turnover in the twelve months to Dec 2008 - See above
What was your profit in the twelve months to Dec 2009 -See above
What was your profit in the twelve months to Dec 2008 - See above
What level of professional indemnity do you hold? - They would sue you for what exactly? Possibly relevant
What level of public and product liability do you hold? They would sue you for what exactly? Possibly relevant ....

Send this ....

How many years have you been trading? 12 years
What was your turnover in the twelve months to Dec 2009 - $2,458,345
What was your turnover in the twelve months to Dec 2008 - $1,867,233
What was your profit in the twelve months to Dec 2009 - $1,744,233
What was your profit in the twelve months to Dec 2008 - $1,432,675
What level of professional indemnity do you hold? $50,000,000 with $5,000 deductible
What level of public and product liability do you hold? max $25,000,000 per claim $10,000 deductible

Note - Information supplied by third party consultancy based upon pretty p*ss poor evidence.

Living Culture · Posted: Sat Mar 27, 2010 11:13 am Post subject:

Diane Maggipinto · Posted: Sat Mar 27, 2010 11:16 am Post subject:

Trading ... pokemon cards?*

*reply influenced by resident 6 year old ...
_________________
sitting at #8, though not as present as I'd like to be. Hello!

www.d3voiceworks.com

Living Culture · Posted: Sat Mar 27, 2010 11:26 am Post subject:

Philip Banks · Posted: Sat Mar 27, 2010 11:54 am Post subject:

Being serious now. Without asking you disclose information about the client and job to perfidious lurkers there isn't really anything constructive to be said other than, in 20 years as a Voiceoversit I have never been asked to disclose the kind of information required in the questionaire you have been sent. I suspect it is part of the supplier vetting procedure which is applied to everyone from the company building the new airliner to the cleaning contractor at the Basingstoke office who works 4 hours per week while her kids are at her Mum's. Is the job worth honest disclosure? Are you embarassed by what you would have to disclose?(Don't answer that here, but ask yourself). Who they are hiring and who they think they are hiring could be 2 entirely different things, as such things are unlikely to proceed to the "you earning stacks of cash stage". This may be one of those damned if you do and damned if you don't deals.

Living Culture · Posted: Sat Mar 27, 2010 12:15 pm Post subject:

Philip Banks · Posted: Sat Mar 27, 2010 12:58 pm Post subject:

The clincher! This is not a genuine work enquiry.

Deirdre · Posted: Sat Mar 27, 2010 2:40 pm Post subject:

Dan-O · The Gates of Troy Joined: 17 Jan 2005 Posts: 1638

From my experience, this looks like the government vetting process for acquisition. When looking new suppliers for a new product or service; their laws and regulations require them to locate multiple vendors and find the differences between them to figure out which would be the cheapest, most reliable and have the highest quality. This really standard stuff for contractors and sub-contractors.

/Right, Eric? (Inside joke.)

EricSouer · Posted: Sat Mar 27, 2010 3:03 pm Post subject:

Yes Dan, that looks to be a fair guess. lol

anthonyVO · 14th Avenue Joined: 09 Aug 2005 Posts: 1470 Location: NYC

Some companies adhere to ISO standards when hiring independent contractors. The questionnaire is part of their ISO requirements.

The problem is that companies that follow ISO standards, while they mean well, don't understand the limited liability of the voice-over artist as independent contractor. Explain this to them and you might have some luck in circumventing this.

-Anthony

Lance Blair · M&M Joined: 03 Jun 2007 Posts: 2281 Location: Atlanta

Good gravy...I understand why some companies would ask these questions, but an "advertising implementation agency" should have better sense than to ask this of a VO or other such freelancer. Blow 'em out the door, they're just going to be a pain to deal with.
_________________
Skype: globalvoiceover
and now, http://lanceblairvo.com the blog is there now too!

Living Culture · Posted: Sun Mar 28, 2010 7:31 am Post subject:

Thanks for all the input! I wouldn't have bothered at all if I hadn't had a standard "sample&rates" query from their US counterpart a few months ago.

I decided that I'll just fill in what I think needs to be filled in and make a note that "all pertinent info has been supplied". This goes against my usual way of doing things; like in a post of Kafer's about supplying information, I have been in same position with people responding without all necessary info.

It just struck me. There is no demo request at all. So if I happen to have a 2000 channel Neve console and net $22K per month do I automatically get the gig?
_________________
Mandarin Chinese Voiceovers & Localization
http://lcmsmedia.com
http://imagesbykenny.com/