Confed-ITA propagates uniform trade practices

With the objective to bring in uniform trade practices in IT market across
the state of Tamil Nadu, Confed-ITA is now going to roll out Common Minimum
Trade Terms (CMTT) among the vendors and has set a time line till August 31 for
implementation of the terms in the practical business.

Keeping in mind the increasing number of issues pertaining to channel
community and non-uniformity across the business level in IT, Confed-ITA has
been working on CMTT for several months. According to the guidelines of CMTT,
vendors will have to follow a uniform trade practice that includes uniform
pricing, no direct dealing, MRP sticker transparency, one dealer selling in
different territories, VAT differences and other issues that create clashes
among the channel community.

The vendors who will confirm to abide by CMTT will be termed as 'preferred
partners' in Tamil Nadu and those who do not will not be supported by Confed-ITA
but will not be banned. Any dealer who will work with non-preferred vendor will
have to do the business at their own risk and the association will not take the
responsibility for any issues that might occur at a later stage.

“We are defining the relation between vendors, dealers and the end customers.
All the vendors functioning in Tamil Nadu will have to implement CMTT in their
trade practice by August 31 this year. However, those who do not confirm will
not be tagged a banned vendors but will eventually lose their credibility among
the channel partners and if anything goes wrong or any issue occurs, Confed-ITA
will not be accountable to solve them and will not support the dealer who deals
with such vendors,” informed PN Prasad, President, Confed ITA.

Besides, in order to create uniformity in pricing of the products and to
increase the involvement of vendors, Confed-ITA has suggested vendors to
increase the price of the products by 0.01 percent. And, the value of the
increased price will be transferred to the welfare fund of the association.

“This will be a very small amount that vendors will have to contribute for
the welfare of the association and they need not do it from their budget. We
have suggested them to increase the price of the products by 0.01 percent and
then transfer that amount to the welfare fund of Confed-ITA,” informed Prasad.

When enquired whether the vendors are aware of such upcoming agenda, Prasad
replied, “We have been sending regular mails to all the vendors who are
operating in Tamil Nadu but none of them have replied. Now we will apply some
uniform policies in the interest of the channel partners,” he said.

The main aim of Confed-ITA is to bring IT trading practice on a uniform
track.