“Which one did you send first?”

“The one with the hall on Highway 7.”

“And the other one?”

“The backyard in Scarborough. I used my sister’s email address.”

Priya sat at the kitchen table. The table was wood. The wood had scratches from the move. She had two browser tabs open on her laptop. The laptop fan made a low noise. She looked at the first reply. The first reply came from a vendor with a mirrored kiosk. The vendor offered a package for a fortieth birthday party. The party had sixty guests. The venue was a banquet hall in Vaughan. The price in the email was nine hundred and forty dollars.

Priya looked at the second reply. The second reply came from the same vendor. The email address was different. The name on the email was different. The party was the same. The guest count was the same. The date was the same. The venue was a backyard in Scarborough. The price in the second email was six hundred and twenty dollars.

Priya did not understand the math. The distance from the vendor’s office to the hall was 12 kilometers. The distance from the vendor’s office to the backyard was 14 kilometers. The backyard was further away. The backyard required more driving. The backyard was cheaper by three hundred and twenty dollars.

Priya felt a specific kind of heat in her face. It was the same heat I felt when I laughed at my uncle’s funeral. The priest had tripped over a plastic flower pot. The sound was loud. I laughed because the situation was heavy and the noise was light. I laughed because the logic of the room broke. People looked at me. They thought I was disrespectful. I was not disrespectful. I was just seeing the truth of the moment. The truth was that a man was gone and a plastic pot was empty.

The truth in Priya’s emails was also simple. The vendor was not pricing the work. The vendor was pricing the venue. The vendor saw the name of the banquet hall. The banquet hall had marble floors. The banquet hall had a fountain in the lobby. The vendor saw the fountain and added three hundred and twenty dollars to the invoice. The vendor assumed Priya had more money because the hall cost more money.

The Mechanics of the “Status Hook”

This is a dark pattern. Muhammad T.J. is a researcher. He studies dark patterns in digital commerce. He looks at how websites trick users. He calls this specific pattern the Status Hook. The website asks for the venue early. The website does not need the venue to calculate the cost of the film. The website does not need the venue to calculate the cost of the attendant. The website needs the venue to guess the limit of the credit card.

Read the fields on a standard inquiry form. The order of the fields matters. The first field is the name. The second field is the email. The third field is the event type. The fourth field is the venue. The guest count is the fifth field. The date is the sixth field. The actual requirements are at the bottom. The number of hours is at the bottom. The type of prints is at the bottom.

The fields that determine the labor are below the fields that determine the budget. This is not an accident. The internal process of the vendor starts with the venue. The vendor looks up the venue on the internet. The vendor sees the price of the wedding packages at the venue. If the venue is expensive, the booth becomes expensive. The vendor assumes the host will not notice an extra three hundred dollars. The host is already spending thousands. The vendor calls this “market-based pricing.” Priya calls it a lie.

The Hidden Cost of Deception

Priya spent the drive to work thinking about the two lies. She wondered which lie was worse. The vendor lied about the cost of the service. Priya lied about where the party would happen. She felt like she had to hide the truth to get a fair price. When a buyer hides the truth, the buyer loses trust. A buyer who does not trust the seller is a buyer who will always look for the exit.

The cost of this system is not just the three hundred and twenty dollars. The cost is the eighty minutes Priya spent sending emails. The cost is the time she spent comparing the replies. She had to reverse-engineer the numbers. She had to act like a detective to find the base price of a camera and a printer.

The Path of Transparency

There is a different way to do business. Some companies do not use the Status Hook. They use a flat rate. They put the price on the website. The price is the same for the hall on Highway 7 and the backyard in Scarborough. The price is based on the hours. The price is based on the equipment.

If you look at the Booth Levels providers use, you can see the difference. A transparent company lists the tiers clearly. They say two hours costs five hundred and seventy-five dollars. They say three hours costs six hundred and seventy-five dollars. They say four hours costs seven hundred and seventy-five dollars. These numbers do not move. The numbers do not change because the venue has a fountain. The numbers do not change because the guest count is sixty instead of fifty.

The price includes the attendant. The price includes the delivery. The price includes the setup. The price includes the takedown. The price includes the unlimited photos. The price includes the prints.

When the price is fixed, the host does not have to lie. The host does not have to use a sister’s email address. The host can look at the budget. The host can see if five hundred and seventy-five dollars fits the budget. If it fits, the host books the service. If it does not fit, the host looks for something else. There is no mystery. There is no detective work. There is no feeling of heat in the face.

The Strength of Clarity

The inquiry form at a transparent company is different. The form asks for the date. The form asks for the time. The form asks for the package. The additions are at the end. A host might add a Keychain Kiosk. The Keychain Kiosk makes keychains on the site. A host might add a Sketch Me Robot. The Sketch Me Robot draws portraits of the guests. These additions have prices. The prices are clear. The prices are added to the base rate. The math is simple.

“Transparency is the enemy of the dark pattern. A dark pattern relies on the user being confused. A dark pattern relies on the user feeling small. When a vendor hides the price, the vendor has the power.”

– Muhammad T.J., Dark Patterns Researcher

Priya felt weak when she read the first email. She felt like she was being watched. She felt like the vendor was looking into her bank account. She did not like the feeling. She wanted to buy a service. She did not want to be appraised like a piece of real estate.

The Performance of Pricing

I think about the funeral again. I think about the plastic pot. The pot was fake. The flowers were fake. The grief was real. The ceremony was a performance. Many business transactions are also performances. The quote form is a performance. The vendor pretends to calculate a custom price. The customer pretends to provide data.

But the calculation is a guess. The guess is based on the venue. If the venue is the Fairmont, the price goes up. If the venue is a community center, the price goes down. The labor is the same. The ink is the same. The paper is the same. Only the perception changes.

This perception creates a permanent suspicion. Even after Priya pays the invoice, she will wonder if she paid too much. She will wonder if someone else paid less for the same thing. She will look at the attendant at the party. She will think about the three hundred and twenty dollars. She will wonder if the attendant is getting that money. The attendant is likely not getting that money. The money is a tax on the marble floors.

The industry teaches customers to withhold information. This is bad for everyone. If the customer hides the venue, the vendor cannot plan the delivery. If the customer hides the guest count, the vendor cannot bring enough supplies. The system of dynamic pricing breaks the logistics of the event. It turns a partnership into a game of poker.

Priya closed her laptop. She did not reply to the vendor with the mirrored kiosk. She did not want to play the game. She wanted to find a company that listed the price on the page. She wanted a company that valued her time. She wanted to pay five hundred and seventy-five dollars because that was the price of the work. She did not want to pay a premium for the fountain in the lobby.

The world is full of dark patterns. They are in our phones. They are in our emails. They are in the way we buy things for our families. We should look for the places where the price is the price. We should look for the companies that do not ask for our status before they tell us the cost.

The backyard in Scarborough and the hall in Vaughan both have the same sky above them. The photo booth should treat them the same way.

The backyard and the banquet hall require the same printer, but they do not require the same bank account.

Priya found a new tab. She typed in the name of a company with clear tiers. She saw the numbers. The numbers were bold. The numbers were easy to read. She felt the heat in her face go away. She was no longer a detective. She was just a person planning a party for her friend. She clicked the button. She entered the date. She entered the time. She knew exactly what she would pay. She knew what she would get for her money. She felt like a human being again.