Basic Retention Package and Premium Services
Transportation Economics offers a number of its services on a retainer and association basis.
Basic Retention Package
Variable Cost Support
Our Basic Retention Package includes two Revenue-to-Variable (RVC) cost studies. By statute, the Board cannot prescribe rates lower than 180% of variable costs. Knowing the RVC ratio facing your facilities or the threshold your firm is limited by is crucial in determining whether a rate complaint or defense can be successful. RVC ratios can also be used to compare your rates to other facilities that have similar movement characteristics to determine if your rates are reasonable or if you can maximize revenues by changes in rates.
Analysis
TEI will provide detailed and personalized analysis of major Board decisions and judicial rulings that affect your business. In every maximum rate case, the Board not only resolves the matters before it but also signals how it will act in the future. Thus, the Board’s decisions influence the regulatory landscape and pricing policies. Understanding these decisions enables our customers to predict with greater confidence how their actions and strategic choices will pay off.
In addition, TEI will provide insights on the financial and economic trends affecting the transportation industry and assess the impact on our customers.
Advice
TEI will be your partner. To provide you with the best possible advice, we want to know your business, your plans, and your goals. The Basic Retention Package allows us to become intimately familiar with your business and your transportation requirements and the economic bounds which can be exploited to profit maximize within the changing regulatory regime.
Premium Services
One of our core competencies is advising seeking regulatory relief from unreasonable railroad rates defending such claims. In addition to providing advice and supervision of rate complaints before the Board, TEI is uniquely positioned to provide:
- Negotiation Support
- Mediation Support
- Lobbying
- Strategic Advice
- Industry Analysis and Reports
TEI can deliver strategic analysis, cost-benefit studies and a variety of special studies. Techniques from microeconomic theory, industrial organization, finance, public choice theory, and game theory are all employed to generate reports that will assist decision makers at a firm identify critical problems and make good decisions.
TEI also can provide insights into the benefits of construction applications and potential build-out and expansion of railroad facilities. TEI believes that our clients should be fully aware of the various options available to them as well as the potential risks and rewards stemming from those options.