Combination Plans As noted earlier, some form of combination pay plan is used to compensate the majority of all sales forces.The incentive portion should be larger when a company is trying to increase its sales or gross margin, especially in the short run.The salary element should be larger when management wants to emphasize customer servicing, a fully balanced selling effort, or team selling.Combination plans introduce a component that we have not yet discussed--namely, a bonus.The word bonus is probably the most loosely used word in the compensation vocabulary.As a result,it is sometimes difficult to accurately assess the extent to which it is used in pay plans.Most of the combined plans fall within the following three categories: o o o Salary plus commission Salary plus bonus Salary plus commission and bonus In a combination pay plan, what portion should be incentive and what portion salary?The incentive portion in combination plans is most often in the 40 percent range.