Abstract
The current paper examines how asking for a report of units of work completed versus cost of the same work can influence overbilling. We suggest that something as simple as asking for a report of units of work completed (for instance, reporting either the time spent or number of units of work completed) as opposed to the cost of the work completed can drive different unethical behaviors. We argue that unit-reporting makes providers feel accountable for their actions, and this induced accountability, in turn, impacts actual billing behaviors. We present seven studies, including a field experiment in the auto-repair industry that demonstrate the effect of different work-report formats on overbilling and provide evidence for our proposed underlying mechanism.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 79-88 |
| Number of pages | 10 |
| Journal | Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes |
| Volume | 130 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Sep 1 2015 |
Funding
The authors gratefully acknowledge comments and helpful suggestions from Max H. Bazerman, Christopher Oveis, James Berry, Isaac Smith, Dolly Chugh, Noah Eisenkraft, Arthur P. Brief, Neeru Paharia and Kristin Smith-Crowe. This research was supported by the Program on Negotiation Fellowship at the Harvard Law School, the Edmond J. Safra Center for Ethics Fellowship at the Harvard University, and the Collins Dawson Endowment at the University of North Carolina.
Keywords
- Accountability
- Decision frames
- Ethical decision-making
- Money
- Overbilling
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Applied Psychology
- Organizational Behavior and Human Resource Management