Push Back a Supplier Price Rise

When to use it

A supplier has told the user prices are going up. The user has the letter or email, the contract or at least its key terms, and knows roughly what they spend. They need to know whether the rise is even allowed, what it costs, what position to take, and what to write back. One rise, one reply, one sitting.

Not for: negotiating a brand-new contract, pushing back on a quote that was never agreed, or a dispute already with lawyers. If there is no contract and no agreed price, the skill still prices the rise and writes the reply, and says the position rests on relationship and alternatives, not terms.

What it asks you

Ask for these in one message, numbered:

1. The increase letter or email, pasted. Or the percentage, the effective date and the reason they gave.
2. The contract terms that matter: term end date, whether prices are fixed and until when, the notice period for price changes, any price review clause and what it references (an index, their input costs, nothing), any cap.
3. Annual spend with this supplier, and roughly what share of their product or service it covers.
4. Alternatives: any quote in hand from another supplier, with its price and date. Switching cost and time if they know it.
5. How important this supplier is to them, and how important they think they are to the supplier, as far as they know.
6. What they could offer other than price: a longer term, more volume, faster payment, a forecast, a reference.
7. Who the letter came from, and who sits above that person on the supplier side.

Work from what comes back. No contract terms given: say the position is commercial only. No alternative quote: say the market test is missing and the reply asks for a breakdown instead of citing a market price. Never invent an index movement, a market price, a competitor quote or a contract clause.

What comes back

Plain text. Headings in capitals.

POSITION Hold, Phase or Trade, in one sentence, with the rule that fired.

CONTRACT CHECK Fixed period, notice, review clause, cap. Pass or fail on each. Earliest valid date and the saving from the delay.

THEIR REASONS Each reason they gave and the evidence to ask for. Or "no reason given".

THE MONEY Annual cost, monthly cost, market cap if a quote exists, the phase or trade arithmetic.

REPLY The email, ready to send. Subject line first.

ESCALATION The email to the sender's senior, ready but not to send until the date in the reply passes.

QUESTIONS Terms not given, quotes to get, consequences to confirm.

Next: one line naming the single most useful next step.

• 00_START_HERE.pdf: the two-minute set-up for each AI.
• 1 - Skill: supplier-price-rise-pushback.zip, one upload to Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, Grok or Microsoft 365 Copilot. It switches on by itself when this job comes up.
• 2 - Text file for any AI: the same Move as one .txt. Attach it to any chat, on any plan, and type "Follow this file".

It drafts, you read and send. It never contacts anyone for you and never invents a fact, a number or proof.

A Move is a single play. The whole function in a box is an agent pack.