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They are rude and arrogant,” “We have to beg them to give attention to us,”
“They don't care about us,” “We would rather do business with large sub-distis
than approach distis, even if we have to pay a higher price to the former”-these
are some of the comments that came from a highly disgusted Goa channel community
at the IT Panchayat held in Margao last week.
Earlier this year, when the IT Panchayat was held for the first time in Goa,
no distributor turned up for the event, which antagonized a lot of dealers. In
fact, the local association decided to discontinue trading with the
distributors, till the senior management stepped in and assured them that
distributors would be more proactive henceforth. But now, things have come to
such a stand, that dealers have started buying from large sub-distributors in
the city, rather than buying from the distributors.
“Once when I went to a distributor to buy one unit of a product, I was told
that the goods were not available. A few moments later, right in front of me, I
saw several units of the same product being bought by another dealer. This
simply means that unless I place bulk orders, distributors are not interested in
trading with me,” complained Prashant Naik of Data World.
Partners also mentioned that there are instances where the distributors sell
directly to end- customers. Naik said, “There is a dosawala in my area who sells
printers. How could he have registered himself with the distributors who
otherwise ask for all company details. This means that distributors are
willingly selling to end-customers, using a loophole in the system.”
The loophole here is that distributors will sell to anyone who can furnish
some details about his company. Partners suggested that to plug this loophole,
distributors should stop selling to dealers who have not made any purchase for a
long period. Terence Viegas, Branch Manager, Ingram Micro India said that there
is no process to un-register in Ingram, at least.
Lack of product knowledge
Reuben Quadros of Texel Computers felt that distributors should know the
product portfolio they carry. Viegas countered saying, “We know about our
inventory, but it is not possible for us to know the details of the technical
specifications of various products. That is for the dealers to know.” However,
Quadros quipped that there were instances where distributors were not even aware
of the models that they carry.
Partners also suggested that distributors should regularly hold product
technical seminars so that partners are able to revert to customer queries in a
better way. This, they claim, is not happening in the city. What is compounding
the problems of the dealers is the dormancy of Goa IT Business Association.
Partners lamented that no meeting has taken place under the aegis of the body
and there is no interaction with the executive council members.
To this, Balakrishan Prabhudesai, President, Goa IT Business Association
stated that there is no active participation by partners themselves and they
don't come to any meeting organized by the association.
This fragmentation in the channel community in Goa, might be a reason why
they have to battle individually for their problems. This could also explain why
distributors do not fear incurring their wrath for any wrongdoing or not
sticking to their commitments.
DQC News Bureau
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