# Independent means paid the same whatever the answer

> Why a retail board should not let the firm that builds the platform decide whether it needs one. How Barking Cat Advisory is paid, what it will never earn from, and the four questions that tell you whether an advisor is independent.

Source: https://barkingcat.ai/independent/

## How we are paid

Most advice a retail board receives on a technology or transformation investment comes from someone who is paid more if the investment goes ahead. This page sets out how Barking Cat Advisory is paid instead, so the board can weigh the advice accordingly.

Barking Cat Advisory is paid a fixed fee by its clients, and nothing else.
- No referral fees from platforms, agencies or vendors.
- No commissions and no success fees.
- No implementation work.
- We do not sell, resell or implement any ecommerce platform: not Shopify, Adobe Commerce (Magento), Salesforce Commerce Cloud, BigCommerce, commercetools or any other.

The same terms apply to every engagement: an [independent replatform assessment](https://barkingcat.ai/ecommerce-replatform-assessment/), an [ecommerce diagnosis](https://barkingcat.ai/independent-ecommerce-consultant/), a [standing role as board adviser on ecommerce](https://barkingcat.ai/independent-board-adviser-ecommerce/) and an [independent AI readiness assessment](https://barkingcat.ai/ai-readiness-assessment-retail/).

Advisory relationships are disclosed to every client before work starts.

## Before you commit, ask who gets paid if you do

The vendor earns the licence. The agency or integrator earns the build. The consultancy with delivery partners earns the referral or the programme. None of this is improper; all of it shapes the recommendation. The only advisor who can write “you do not need this” without cost to themselves is the one who was never going to earn from it.

## Not interim cover

Barking Cat guides the work, shapes it and will contribute to it. It does not fill a seat. If the answer is that you need a permanent operator in the role, that is the advice you will get, and there will be no invoice for a stand-in.

## How Barking Cat Advisory is paid

Fixed fee, stated in writing before instruction. Scope adjusts to the business; the price does not adjust to the answer.
- **No execution.** Barking Cat does not implement, build, deliver, select vendors on commission or place people. Where a plan needs delivery capability, the client contracts it directly.
- **No contingent reward.** No success fee, no fee linked to valuation or exit, no equity or carry in a client business, no referral arrangement in either direction.
- **One side of a deal.** Barking Cat does not read a target for a buyer where a client-side engagement with that target is live or was live inside the prior twelve months, and does not advise a seller on a business it has read for a buyer.
- **Disclosure.** A register of vendor advisory relationships and delivery partner arrangements is shared with every engagement.

## Four questions that tell you whether an advisor is independent

## Why this is the house rule

Sometimes the finding of a Review is that the replatform is unnecessary, the agency is not the problem, or six months of data and pricing discipline would return more than a £3m programme. That answer is only available from an advisor who does not earn from the build. It is also the reason the Review earns its keep whether or not the next step is Barking Cat.

[Should we replatform? Six questions to ask before the vendor answers for you.](https://barkingcat.ai/thinking/should-we-replatform/)

[The Barking Cat Review](https://barkingcat.ai/review/)

**[Thirty minutes, no deck.](https://barkingcat.ai/#contact)**

## Contact

steve@barkingcat.ai

Barking Cat Advisory Limited. Registered in England and Wales, company number 17338003.