Legal Forum: Does Flat-Rate Pricing Deceive Consumers?
Most states have consumer protection laws that govern the manner in which citizens are to be invoiced for services rendered. A few contractors suggest that their overhead is so high that they are forced to use a pricing method called flat rate to hide the labor cost they allegedly are required to charge to make a decent profit.
The consumer protection laws, however, imply that intentionally “hiding” the labor charges — for any purpose — is a violation of the state’s desire to have open and fair pricing of such work, as set forth in their adopted consumer protection laws.