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Business licensing and it's current state


TinPan

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Just as the title says really.

I'll jump straight into things and just outright voice my disdain for the new business licensing, especially disdain towards the costs that are attributed towards the licensing costs that are outlined in the recently-published handbook. It's an enormous cause for concern and as far as I'm concerned serves as nothing but a detriment for unique server businessses that operate as well as the overall quality of business roleplay.

It's fair enough if this thread gets locked and staff request for this to be taken IC, but considering the OOC implications of the recent licensing handbook publication; I feel 100% secure in saying that a thread of this kind is important to keep up so that people can voice their opinions on the subject.

For those who haven't seen the recently published page, below is simply a snapshop of the most important part of the business licensing application; the costs & available licenses for each business:
M4U11U1.png

As you can see, it's safe to say that paying for licenses is now a notably costworthy endeavour to approach and that certain business owners will be taking a notable amount of money out from their pockets. For some business owners who can easily rake in millions each month, these costs are pretty much nothing and this doesn't affect them whatsoever. For business owners though who work jobs in real life or those who operate niche businesses that focus more on roleplay than profits? This becomes a considerably huge issue that a lot of business owners on the server will face.

Under the current licensing, stores will need to apply for the general conduct license at a minimum which isn't too much of an issue; since 30k can typically be made up rather quickly in under a month depending on the number of openings & money earnt from individuals entering the businesss. However, the moment that the other licenses are added on top of the general conduct; the cost immediately jumps from 30k up to an immediate 100k. For some businesses this is fine, but for the large majority; this is incredibly detrimental.

There's a multitude of businesses that operate on the server at the moment who are focused predominantly on roleplay and less focused on profits, only earning money provided by the government for entrants and nothing else; who chances are may currently not hold full server activity due to a multitude of real life reasons. Under the new licenses, this means that they've got to (at a minimum depending on the business) scrape up at least 30k to pay the license. I'm sure I can speak for multiple people who work and are only able to play the server for a few hours a week when I say that it'd be absolutely soul-crushing to come home from work onto a roleplay server just to work again as opposed to... well, actually roleplaying.

Not only will small businesses suffer hugely, larger businesses will also suffer as well as competition for business openings quickly becomes incredibly frustrating to deal with since every business will suddenly be opening in an attempt to earn enough money to pay off the licensing. Rather than seeing 2 nightclubs open in one night with all of them being packed to the brim, you'll see about 6 - 7 nightclubs instead with pretty much nobody present within them whatsoever. That's just for nightclubs alone, this doesn't take into account other business types such as bars, cafes and any other business variant. Every business will be ramping up their prices, and by subsequent, the quality of roleplay will suffer across the board as business owners neglect roleplay quality in favour of more frequent openings & profit-making.

It'd literally mean that money would take priority over roleplaying.

For example, I operate a mini-market which lets players roleplay having certain ethnic goods for sale that they can purchase; with the majority of my profits being earned purely from entrant payments and nothing else so that I can focus on the roleplay side of things. With the new licenses? I'd have to pay a total of $115,000 to cover the costs of just the General Conduct License, the Liquor Sales License and the Cigarette & Tobacco License just to operate a mini-market. I'd have to ramp up the prices of all the goods I sell in order to make up for the cost, especially considering that I operate a niche business that doesn't focus on money-making. Not only that, but considering I also have to balance my free time with university work; I don't always have the time to dedicate a few hours of my week to roleplaying, let alone opening my business.

Players shouldn't have to join a roleplay server with their first thought being "I need to open my business to pay off my business licensing costs." as far as I'm concerned, especially ones who have limited free time as it is to roleplay. It's detrimental to the quality of overall roleplay and will just see prices being inflated as well as more businesses with less people in them being open. Money should never take priority over people's roleplay, ever.

That's my opinion on the matter at least though regarding the current state. I'm eager to see if other players on the server at the moment hold the same sentiment as I do regarding this or if my argument doesn't reflect the large majority of current business owners.

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I understand a general business license for all operating businesses for let's say $10.000 per quarter, and with higher license costs for businesses who make a lot of profit in GTAW (automotive and gambling), but the ones that put a lot of effort in staffing and creating roleplay shouldn't be burdened with these costs.

 

Yes, businesses make a decent chunk of money, but they also put in work to make roleplay happen. These licensing costs are too high.

Edited by mj2002
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Licensing was always this way, people just got far too used to the fact it had to be rebuilt after Rockford. So people were churning out businesses for free and raking in the green ones. When in actual reality, these types of licenses and costs reflect the IRL status of businesses. 

 

tl;dr of an already short point; owning businesses aren't free, you need to license them, so realism is upheld.

 

as for prices of it, /maybe/ they're too high. I'm not sure how licensing works internally, so chances are they'd get lowered soon. 

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Prices are too high. Expecting strip clubs to pay 150k every 3 months is absurd. These clubs already barely make profit after all the costs that need to be paid (dancers salary, bar staff salary, security salary, manager salary). These prices will only further make the types of businesses that require minimal investment while making larger profit margins more sought after instead of roleplay businesses that barely break a profit. This is not even accounting for if the business is leased and requires a monthly payment as well.

 

You will end up with players just doing spam openings to farm their goverment aid instead of conducting quality openings.

Edited by Naeno
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Why does every business on the server require a license? I understand those who sell alcohol, tobacco etc etc, but generic stores that sell things shouldn't need a license to operate as realistically they would be paying more in taxes etc anyway. Some businesses have had the 20k fee removed, that fee was used in whole by some to pay staff and help them make a slight profit per opening.

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