Licenses
In order to bid on a particular foreign-government contract, your company must first be licensed to transact business in the foreign country. Your company’s application has been pending for several months, and without the license you will be technically disqualified to bid. You have received a call from the company’s foreign-country manager seeking your approval to pay $500 to a government clerk to “jump the licensing queue.”

• Does the size of the payment matter? What if it was $50? $5000?
• Does it matter what “jump the queue” means?
• What if there is only a limited supply of the licenses and demand exceeds supply?
• Would such a payment be made to obtain or retain business?

Visas
You are an employee of your company’s subsidiary in a foreign country. It is your responsibility to ensure that expatriate employees obtain their work visas to assist the company’s operations in the country.

Some visa applications have been pending for two months and the employees are due to arrive next week to participate in critical meetings. A local agent tells you that if you pay a small fee to the processing clerk, the visas will be expedited. Given the urgency of the situation, you give $50 cash to the clerk, and the visas are promptly granted.

To avoid any questions from your supervisor regarding the purpose of the payment, you simply describe it as “visa fees” on your expenditure reimbursement form.

• Is the visa processing clerk a foreign official under the FCPA?
• Is the $50 payment a “facilitating payment”?
• Would it make a difference if the payment was only $5? What about $500?
• Is “visa fees” a reasonably accurate characterization of the payment? If not, how should the payment be recorded?

If you have any questions regarding these scenarios, please contact us.