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XchangeIT set to move on newsagents who fail to comply with standards

XchangeIT has written to newsagents who are not meeting compliance criteria in an effort to get them across the line and compliant.  Here is what they had to say:

Since the beginning of May 2011, we have been alerting you to the fact that your store has not been compliant in passing your ITCs for sales inventory data in your last six (6) performance cycles.  Good, accurate sales inventory data is critical to improvements in magazine supply.

Subsequent to this we have also sent out Headlines on the XchangeIT Newsagent Client program, again alerting you or your staff to the fact, and pointing out that if you are not compliant, then you are no longer eligible for the discounted fee that you have been given since joining XchangeIT.

On the 16th January 2012 we will be generating an Invoice for you for 3 months in arrears on your billing cycle which is $112.50 plus GST ($123.75), and from your next billing cycle you will be charged at the base rate being $425 plus GST ($467.40). If however in this time you do start passing your ITCs for sales inventory data, you will not receive this invoice and you will remain on the Discounted Fee of $200 plus GST ($220.00).

Additionally, newsagents who do not pass their Performance Cycle will no longer be eligible for EDI returns via the XchangeIT platform from the 16th January 2012.  This means you will have to enter your Returns Claims manually into each distributor’s web site which will take you longer, be prone to mistakes and lead to credits being delayed.

Our aim is to have all Newsagents on the discounted rate, and to see all agents pass their performance cycles,  if you have any questions please call us on 1.300.551.212 or email support@xchangeit.com.au .

Be part of the solution, not part of the problem – send accurate sales data.

While I support this move, I remain frustrated with the poor customer service by XchangeIT as I wrote about recently.

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  1. SHAUN S

    It amuses me that there are at least 2 other blog post on here about over supply which proves they are not using the data anyway . Maybe the guys at GG would like to pay these extra fee . (i have not received any of these emails YET but anything is possible )

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  2. Narelle

    I continue to be extremely frustrated at having to lose the profit on $2,000 of magazine sales just to pay for XchangeIT.

    As a small newsagency, $440 a year is a lot of money & I strongly object to paying for software that benefits only the distributors.

    Isn’t this the same as Coles now asking their suppliers to pay for the Coles website?

    Entering the data online at the 2 distibutors websites is looking increasingly attractive!

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  3. Derek

    I think Narelle touched on something that is relevant – Due to the vast range of Newsagencys, I believe small Newsagencys could use Netonline & GotchConnect. It would however be labor intensive for Medium and above Newsagencies to not use XchangeIt.

    Some may think it is not in the best interest to do so, however this is a overhead that some actually do not need to use thus not pay for.

    No wonder in my view Newsagencys struggle to pay Magazine accounts with charges such as these. The question is, are Newsagents being overcharged for using this facility.

    It sounds as though their customer Service does not warrant the fees charged.

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  4. Long time supporter

    XChangeIT does benefit Newsagents. You save time, effort and money in receipting stock. You save time and money in doping returns. it’s not difficult.

    Newsagents need to stop being afraid of technology and stop being so sensitive about their data. The Distributors argument is that not enough agent provide quality data in a timely manner! The more newsagents who provide data to the Distributors the more we can push back on them. Besides in in your interest to give them to data you get a cheaper rate for XchangeIT.

    Why make an investment in a POS system if you’re not going to use EDI!

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  5. Long time supporter

    Also I agree about the customer service there, or lack of. Too many times they just blame the distributors or POS vendors.
    I recently had that happen with a return for Network only half of it processed. I called XchangeIT and they said it was a POS problem. I called my POS and they said that the file generated ok. I rang Network Customer Service but they couldn’t work it out so they passed me onto a guy called Daniel Tisi, he fixed it right away by resubmitting the file. He said that we had some kind of time out error and that I could see this if I look at the file notes in future. I asked him where to look and he said it’s available on the Central Site and in the client. Apparently XchangeIT customer service have access to the same information so why on earth couldn’t they do what Daniel did.

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  6. Leon

    We received the same email yesterday.
    We also received it about 2 months ago. We do our returns via XchangIT and get replies saying NO EXCEPTIONS. We get extra mags via sales based replenishment. WHY ??? are we considered not compliant.
    We have asked the question but they can never tell us WHY.

    They are a bunch of clowns and for some reason we are paying the circus fee.

    VERY frustrating – we just want to know WHY?????? but they never tell us.

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  7. Steven

    I have heard from someone at Xchangeit that GG no longer want to pay their half of the $440 Xchangeit fee, so are citing poor data as an excuse to pass on the cost to newsagents.

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  8. News

    Long time,

    We are not afraid of technology. But this data is worth big bucks.

    This industry seemed ok from the outside, but everything turned out to be TAKE TAKE TAKE.

    Mags, Papers, Lotto, all the same

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  9. Mark

    Narelle, the fee should be based on what you spend on magazines in a year. This would be fairer to smaller newsagents.

    Steven, distributors use this excuse too often in my view.

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  10. Steven

    Leon,

    We have always been compliant, but received the same email last year.
    We responded by saying that we would not accept an increase in fees unless they provided hard evidence of non-compliance. The next invoice was for the discounted rate, and have never had problems since.

    If you challenge them, they might drop this money-grabbing ploy.

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  11. Derek

    20 year – understand what you are saying, however it is not a case of being afraid of new tech – I am afraid of the overheads that are associated with being a Newsagent.

    Mark- I believe that should be looked into – A fairer way of payment based on sales.

    Its a Bully letter that could of been written with respect for its customer. One does not see letters sent to customers like this very often.

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  12. Long time supporter

    Dereck I agree its a bully letter, did they even try and work with those agents who got the letter to make them compliant? my guess is no and thats becuase they want more money.

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  13. hz

    We got a similar letter last year and rang X-IT to find out how come we weren’t compliant, they flicked one little box their end and suddenly we were compliant.
    Funny that.

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  14. Vicki

    Well, we’re not compliant because the POS system we have is rather antiquated and can’t send sales data. We only use Xchangeit to get the invoices. Considering the cost, how hard is it to completely do away with Xchangeit and do them manually? Does anyone still do this? We’re a fairly good sized country newsagent, so I’m weighing up the time cost in doing it manually versus the cost of Xchangeit. I’d love to be able to replace my POS sysytem, but can’t afford to right now. SO I’ve got to work with what I have.

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  15. rick

    manual magazine arrival ? you have to be kidding – dont even go there. Up to date POS system is worth its weight in gold, without plugging Tower, im sure they can arrange finacing and there are generous tax write offs atm so worth looking into it

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  16. John

    If i am to pay the higher amount nothing will be going back to them

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  17. rick

    the bit i cant understand is why anyone would not be compliant, i dont do anything but let the system run as it should and my compliance is fine (as far as i know) My pos is up to date, i dont try and pull any shonkys if i receive extra stock or stock that is that not mine, i usually dump it, all stock is rec thru the system and all sales are scanned out, subbies are allocated thru the system and their returns are scanned out thru the system, all pretty basic stuff in my books

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  18. Steven

    Vicki,

    If you have to pay someone to do manual returns, it will cost you more in one week than a year of XchangeIT.

    If you do it yourself, you may never have time for sleep again.

    Used to take me 2 full days to send back 5 Reflex boxes worth of returns, tops and fulls mixed.

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  19. Brendan

    Vicki, update your POS. It’s not just the magazines that are easier. GNS, Hallmark and manyother suppliers are downloadable via Tower. We used to use MYOB Retail Manager and while it did a good job having the lasest version of Tower makes life soooo much better and easily pays its way.

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  20. Vicki

    Steven, I do the mag returns via the websites now and its not too bad. I do it myself and it takes a couple of hours a week.

    I agree that my old POS has to go, but can’t afford it yet. I like what I’ve seen and heard of Tower.

    The biggest cost is not going to be the software, its having to replace the hardware that’s putting me off. It will all need to go as its so old that a modern program won’t recognize them!

    I have a lovely computer tech that keeps my system hobbling along for now, but eventually there will be something we can’t repair and the whole thing will have to go.

    I’d like to get another year or two out of it before I change over, but who knows if it will last that long!

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  21. Derek

    So I guess the majority are for paying for another overhead called XchangeIT, we are not talking about POS systems here.

    Of course the Newsagencies which are medium to large specialist it is a no brainer and should be used, however I believe anyone under 300 titles give or take you can save yourself some money.

    From my observations I am of the view you are paying for a Rolls Royce and getting a Mini Minor in return. I am looking at an overhead point of view and a customer Service point of view.

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  22. Paul

    Derek I would agree with your summary.

    I don’t have XchangeIT as I was warned off by the previous owner as it being something that was too expensive for the gains. In the intervening 18 months I’ve thought about it a couple of times but can’t make a reasonable business case for it expenditure wise to convince myself. We only do about $8-10K a month in magazines so for me its pretty simple to just input the mags manually myself on a Mon/Wed/Friday morning while I’m at the counter early inbetween serving customers. Returns don’t take a much longer with staff sorting and pulling the mags and inputting the into our Tower POS and me putting them into the suppliers systems. Infact the double checking works well and we don’t have too many issues. Best of all I find that entering the mags in myself I can catch any blatant oversupplies before I even enter them into the system sometimes.

    BTW, I still do greeting cards/etc by EDI input so it’s not that I’m afraid of using the technology.

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  23. Paul

    Just had to laugh as I’ve just received a flyer with my John Sands account for the month prompting me to sign up with XchangeIT for greeting cards !

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