A Meridian, Idaho-based firm that performed drug-and-alcohol testing services to commercial motor carriers and their drivers illegally invited one of its competitors to enter into a customer allocation agreement, according to a settlement order issued by the Federal Trade Commission.
In a Jan. 21 final order, the FTC said that Drug Testing Compliance Group LLC “is barred from soliciting, entering into, or maintaining an agreement with any competitor to divide markets, allocate customers, or fix prices; and from urging any competitor to raise, fix, or maintain prices, or to limit or reduce service.”
The FTC complaint said that in July 2014, DTC President David Crossett proposed to one of its competitors that the two firms agree not to solicit or compete for one another’s customers.
“Specifically, Mr. Crossett proposed that DTC Group and Competitor A should reciprocally agree to refrain from selling or attempting to sell a service to a customer if the rival firm had previously arranged to sell the same service to the customer,” the complaint said. “Mr. Crossett referred to this arrangement as 'First Call Wins,' and explained that such agreement would allow each company to sell its services to customers without fearing that its rival would later undercut it with a lower price offer.”
Crossett could not be reached for comment.
However, Bo Schmelling, CEO of Boise, Idaho-based Unified Compliance Services, said his company bought DTC’s assets and that DTC has since been dissolved.
“What happened is I had an opportunity to take on a company that was failing,” Schmelling told Transport Topics. “We did not buy the company but the assets. They were failing, going under, because of the nonsense that they had put themselves through.”
