Transfer: An expert system approach to transfer pricing

This paper explores the development of a PC-based expert system for transfer price decision making. The expert system (TRANSFER) is based on the premise that, if the corporate goal structure, market structure, costing systems, and other relevant variables are known, it is possible to arrive at the appropriate transfer price by applying a set of optimization rules. VP-Expert was the PC-based expert system shell used to develop TRANSFER. VP-Expert uses backward chaining to solve problems using IF-THEN rules. TRANSFER was designed, tested, and modified to yield the appropriate transfer pricing strategy in a variety of decision scenarios.