Why you must report it: the only thing that stops this

Hidden commissions do not survive because people think they are right. They survive because everyone has a reason to say nothing.

• The person taking it has an incentive to keep it quiet.
• The person paying it has an incentive to keep it quiet, because the order depends on it.
• The crew who see it are afraid for their jobs.
• The brokers who do not take part are afraid of being seen as difficult.
• The owners and charter guests do not know.
• The honest suppliers are afraid to say anything because they will be called bitter.
• The associations and brokerages may not want to look.

A practice that depends on everybody's silence ends when enough people stop being silent. Reporting is not an act of disloyalty. It is the only thing that works.

Five reasons to report

1. Because the next person will say yes. A request that is refused and not reported is made again, to someone else. Reporting lets someone see the pattern.

2. Because the owner is being deceived. The people who lose are the people whose money it is. It is their money, and they have a right to know where it goes.

3. Because you are exposed too. A captain who knows and says nothing, a purser who sees an unusual invoice, a broker who knows about a colleague: all can find themselves, later, asked what they knew and when.

4. Because it is the law that is being broken. In most countries this is a crime, with real consequences for the individuals and companies involved, and for the ones who knew.

5. Because honest people are losing. Every order that goes to a supplier who pays a kickback is an order that did not go to one who did not. In the end, that is the market deciding that honesty does not pay.

"It's how things work"

It is how some things work, in some places. Years ago, it was how many things worked, and management companies were created to change that. Practices that were normal in one generation are not normal in the next. They change when people stop accepting them.

"I'll be called a grass"

You may be. But the word "grass" suggests someone betraying their own side. The side you owe loyalty to, if you spend someone else's money, is the person whose money it is. Telling the truth to the person you act for is not betrayal.

"No one will do anything"

Sometimes that is true of a single report. Reports add up. A pattern recorded across years, across companies and countries, with dates and documents, is exactly what lawyers, regulators and prosecutors act on. And a single report made safely, privately, with your own protection first, costs you very little.

How to report safely

1. Write down what happened, and keep records. See How to raise a concern safely.
2. Choose a route. Privately through us, through your company, through a lawyer, or to an authority.
3. Take advice on your own protection first. We can introduce a lawyer.
4. Do not post it online. It protects nobody, and exposes you.

What happens after you report

With us, nothing leaves without your permission. You decide at each step. A qualified lawyer reviews your concern, if you agree, before anything goes further, and we introduce the right legal team or authority. You can stay anonymous throughout. You can change your mind.

General information, not legal advice. See the disclaimer.