Kudaro
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Posted - 2007.07.24 20:42:00 -
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You pay a broker to sell some items for you. You offer the broker 1% of the final price of anything sold. That 1% is sunk cost regardless of whether or not the order goes through (I do not know about if the order time limit expires though). Minus the order modification fee, any change in the order after the initial order placement does not change the original amount offered to the broker to sell the items. So, why should the broker charge you a percent fee on the items if the items are already in the warehouse, packaged, and ready to be sold? It seems to me that all the broker must do is change a listing in the computer which pops up on all the market displays in the region. That is too little work to charge me a percent fee for a order modification.
If the order was canceled, then perhaps a order modification fee should be charged. But one may also argue that it is akin to selling the product to oneself (except that one does not have to pay tax) as the order is going from the broker's warehouse to a person's/player's hanger.
In any event, I reject your suggestion on the basis that as a "broker fee", the broker itself has no incentive to any dreaces in price that the seller wants to make. Otherwise, the broker can give me a differance back in the original "broker's fee" that I was charged as the price is no longer that high.
The argument above pretty much becomes invalid for a order modification that results in a price increase. So, I suppose that for order modifications that result in a price increase, the broker should charge a percent based order modification fee and for prices that result in a price decrease, the broker should charge a flat rate fee as the broker no longer has any incentive in whether or not the product sells (the broker already recieved a 1% fee upfront that is nonrefundable) so a flat fee (small enough to cover the cost of changing the product's price) would encourage price changes that sell the product quicker. Thus, the broker obtains warehouse space quicker than expected (as the product sells before the order period expires).
My thoughts are incomplete and rambelings. If anyone would like to clarify them, then I would be very thankful. Essentially, I am looking at the issue through the broker's perspective since the fee is, after all, a "broker's fee".
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