Outsourcing Frequently Asked Questions

What is Outsourcing ?

Outsourcing is the business practice of hiring a party outside a company to perform services that were traditionally performed in-house by the company’s own employees and staff.

Rawhide is a U.S. corporation that provides a wide range of enhanced outsourcing services through a strategic partnership with the KG Group, a Billion Dollar Indian conglomerate.  Rawhide and KG personnel can be identified by the client to their customers as independent contractors,  subcontractors, consultants, agents, or contract employees at their option. Rawhide will utilize the client technology and systems or interface into the IT department depending upon the nature of the requirements.

What are the advantages of outsourcing?

High quality contract Personnel

State of the Art Technology and Facilities

Management Coordination, Control, and Auditing

Flexibility and Scalability

Professional Standards and Accreditations

Recognized Security Levels for Healthcare and Government

Cost Effective Solutions

How to select an outsourcing partner?

The client should choose an outsourcing partner that has the capabilities to support the operations in both the short term and long term considerations including necessary management and security controls.  A long history of successful operations should be considered essential for reliability and risk management

Rawhide will coordinate all aspects of the outsourcing with KG and provide an expert work force using proprietary technology to increase productivity, integrated with owned and operated colleges located in an owned enterprise zone recognized and utilized by many large multinational corporations operating in India.  Rawhide and KG have over 25 years of outsourcing experience with major U.S. corporations and hundreds of satisfied clients.

What is the difference between offshore, near shore, and onshore outsourcing

Offshore outsourcing utilizes resources that are provided in countries significantly distant while near shoring references resources that are provided in countries that are usually located within 1,000 miles of the client operation and onshore outsourcing utilizes resource that are located in the same country as the client but may be performed by foreign nationals working under visas.

Rawhide is a Wyoming corporation with headquarters located in Ohio; however, the outsourcing resources are located in India, Mexico, and Belize under a partnership with the KG Group.  Contracting is with Rawhide and they can provide management coordination but all work is performed outside the United States.  In the past, Rawhide and KG used to provide onshore resources with H1B visas but has discontinued that service except for medical personnel.

What is the difference between transactional outsourcing and a shared service center?

Transactional outsourcing relates to the nature of the processes and tasks outsourced and are well defined such as call centers, research, data analysis, accounting, claims processing, and software development.  Shared service centers remove entire functional operations such as human resources, revenue cycle management, and Information technology and place the responsibility in a third party company which may or may not be owned by the client.  Location of the resources is immaterial and may be in the home country or foreign location.

Rawhide has the capability of providing a wide range of both transactional outsourcing as well as operating a shared service center however the relationship is always contractual with no client ownership.

What is remote outsourcing?

Remote outsourcing consists of individual resources operating under the contractual umbrella of a third party company but acting as independent contractors.  There is no central facility where the resources perform their duties often causing management, quality, auditing, productivity, and security issues for the client.  Location is often driven by availability of resources and cost.

Rawhide does not utilize remote outsourcing and all personnel are employees of either Rawhide or KG and work in owned corporate facilities under management auspices.  KG owns and operates a major technology park recognized by the Global Practice of the World Bank Group as a perfect environment for multinational companies and model for investment.

What is “enhanced outsourcing” ?

Enhanced outsourcing is the next level of client support where the third party not only provides individual resources but also utilizes proprietary technology to increase productivity while reducing costs as well as including a corporate structure providing management, quality assurance, information systems, and physical security.

The Rawhide and KG partnership is the only organization providing “enhanced outsourcing” in the world.

What are the important terms and conditions for outsourcing contracts ?

In addition to the legal boiler plate, the primary issues to consider are:

  1. Length of contract and cancellation provisions.
  2. Arbitration requirement
  3. Choice of Laws and Venue
  4. Intellectual Property rights
  5. Fees, Billing, and Surcharges

The Rawhide service agreement is open ended with the client able to terminate the contract at any time with ten days notice.  For contract issues, binding arbitration under the rules of the AAA is mandatory and the choice of laws is Wyoming with the venue either Toledo, Ohio or Cheyenne, Wyoming.  Rawhide prefers to bill based upon hourly rates but under certain circumstances will consider fixed price proposals.  Any statement of work that includes the development of intellectual property or data transfers ownership to the client upon payment of the fees..  Unless specifically included in the Statement of Work, Rawhide does not have any surcharges or license fees and hourly activities are fully documented.