Whats a fair sales commission?

[John Prophet]

Do any of you earn sales commission or other commissions for computer retail sales? What is a fair commission to ask for when "re-negotiating your contract"?

Thanks, JP

[John Prophet]

Dont be shy, just tell it alllllllllll.

You're commission should be ..

You sell a computer.. the company had a 30 point (%) margin on it.. (the profit) you get 30 % of the profit.
So the more you make for the company the more you make..
What ever percent profit the company makes from the sale you get the same percentage of the profit.. make sense?
the company gets 300 in profit.. you sold it for 20 percent over cost.. so your cut is 20% of the 300 bucks..
You boss should like that.. it encourages sales people to get the most out of stuff and not give it away.. cause when they do they loose out too.l

[John Prophet]

The only problem there is that its hard to tell the exact margin all of the time. Lets say I build up a comp from traded in parts...lets say I have an AT case, I buy a new motherboard, put in a k6-2 500 we have had laying around, 2 meg trade in pci vid card, refurb 17" monitor, etc...sell it all for $450. very hard to say in that case what the margin is.

I see that being a real problem with certain bosses....many would just straight up lie to the employee about the margin. Would seem to be better to base it off the actual sale price. Is it ever done that way?

JP

[Mntsnow]

well since I have never had to worry about paying someone else I honestly dont know how to answer the question... I would assume that the owner plans on an average % upcharge on everything. I worked my business on a flat 10% upcharge on parts and then I charged an hourly rate but that was in my line of business...I didnt have a "storefront" to have to pay for...

I see that being a real problem with certain bosses....many would just straight up lie to the employee about the margin.

There is always an exact bottom line.
I would never work for an employee that lied, but that's me.

There is always a way to cost out an item.
Every part would have a value attached to it.. where it was laying around or not.. Labor is figured in, everything.

Heck I took a class on it at UCLA, "cost price analysis"..
Labor, parts and overhead everything is figured in...

Even if the parts are traded in/used/old, you can always put a notional cost to it as Surreal says. Benchmark it to current cost for a new part. I don't feel this is really an issue.

More important for the Boss Man to agree to a percentage.

If the Boss lies to you, leave. Because he's probably shafting you in other ways too.