Glaxo Outrages Suppliers With Demand For Retroactive Rebates

Nearly one year after being admitted to the small business ‘Hall of Shame’ in the UK, GlaxoSmithKline has once again outraged many of its suppliers with payment tactics (back story). This time, the drugmaker is being chastised for seeking retroactive rebates from marketing agencies for work already performed and a so-called ‘sign on’ bonus in order to be readmitted to its roster of preferred suppliers. “If your agency has performed work for GSK in 2013, please provide a (percentage) rebate for the 2013 global annual spend by GSK,” according to letters sent suppliers. “For all future GSK annual spend levels, please provide a percentage rebate. All agencies must complete this question. If selected to be a part of the GSK Global Digital Roster, please indicate a one-time sign-on bonus you will offer GlaxoSmithKline.” Alexander Jackman of the Forum for Private Business, a group that represents small business in the UK, tells Outsourcing Pharma that “this is not normal practice and nor should it become normal practice, especially for a company such as GSK.” The group also wrote UK Prime Minister David Cameron to complain (here is the letter). “The demands are naked profit-chasing. They are outrageous,” one source told Sky News, which first reported the Glaxo demand. A Glaxo spokesman told Sky: “As part of a long running programme we are reducing complexity in these relationships by increasing the levels of business we place with key suppliers while securi...
Source: Pharmalot - Category: Pharma Commentators Authors: Source Type: blogs