SALES SCRIPTS, BULLETS, AND THE ONE-TWO PUNCH 183 to engage you in conversation with a question such as, ``You don't like to make money?'' The broker knows that the longer he can keep you talking, the better his chances of delivering a knockout blow. At that moment, the vigilant investor throws the haymaker--``Nope''--and hangs up. Silence and Slippery Answers While every brokerage firm has a commission schedule that outlines the standard charges for the purchase of different types of securities (stocks, bonds, options, and so on), your broker has not told you that she can discount the commissions. The trick here is for the broker to keep her mouth shut about that fact. And, indeed, why would the broker forgo earning the maximum commission by telling you such a thing? To answer that question, think back to your initial meeting with the broker. Unless the meeting was unusual, the broker gave you the impression that she would give anything short of her child's kid- ney to help you meet your financial goals. Now try to square that with your broker's deliberately keeping quiet about your being entitled to give her less of your money. Some of your broker's customers never pay what's printed on the official commission schedule. They ask for, and routinely receive, a discount from the published schedule. Why don't you get those dis- counts? Because you haven't asked. If your account is small and your demands on the broker's time are great, he might refuse you that dis- count, figuring that it's not worth the effort to keep your account. But that reaction is rare. For some investments, like mutual funds that charge a commission and unit investment trusts, 2 the issuer of the securities mandates a American Managememt Association · www.amanet.org