The software on offer from POS Solutions, a competitor of my company, does not currently comply with magazine distributor standards. It has not complied for around three years. POS will be able to provide proof of their compliance in writing from the distributors once they have achieved this. Ask for this proof.
Software from my company is compliant and Computerlink has been since the beginning of IT standards for newsagents. It frustrates me that there is silence by so many – suppliers, newsagents and newsagent associations about the failure of POS Solutions to deliver compliant software.
Compliant software saves newsagents time and money. Non compliant software costs time and money. If industry suppliers cannot adhere to standards what hope is there for newsagents?
This silence by suppliers and associations has to end as it will be the only to pressure POS to deliver compliant DOS and Windows software. I sad DOS because most of their users still run DOS and there is no technical reason for them to hold back providing compliance on their DOS platform and therefore save newsagents the $15K+ it costs to migrate.
While POS will complain to their lawyers about this they would be better off spending the money necessary to provide compliant DOS and Windows software.
Be specific. What excaclty is not complient?
Simon
Non compliant means failing on any one or all of the documented current IT standards agreed by the magazine distributors and software companies. Includes: sending sales data, receiving invoices, processing returns via EDI. I know POS is not sending sales data and that they are not currently sending EDI returns data. Whatever they do must be in both systems given how recently they sold their DOS software to newsagents.
we have no intention of being compliant.
Further to the above post, the DOS system will never provide electronic returns as it is an old and out of date program this is why we are converting our existing customers to the browser, which is a minor expense. Zac
Zac, You sold your DOS system to newsagents, from what I understand, as recently as a year and a half ago – when it was not compliant. This means you have, in my view, an obligation. The costs of switching to your windows software are significant. $15,000 plus from what I hear. Sure there may be no software fee but annual support of $3,000+ and required on site time costing $5,000 plus hardware standards way beyond what a small business can justify. Your Windows software poses a considerable barrier to entry to a typical sized newsagency. Having said all that, your Windows software is not currently compliant and this has been the case since its release.
Mark, I draw your attention to a letter you were forced to distribute to all newsagencies on 22 August 2005 as ordered by the ACCC. I quote from the last paragraph, “We apologise for any misstatements that have occurred and acknowledge and accept the finding by the ACCC that Tower systems have behaved in misleading and deceptive conduct….”. I would suggest to you that your post is along the same lines and we look forward to a retraction.
The windows software is not compliant because the distributors are still working out all the bugs at their end. We understand that your software requires the newsagent to re-structure their data files every day which takes about an hour. How much money does this cost the newsagent? Zac
Zac, The letter to which you refer has nothing to do with the fact that your software in not compliant. You are wrong to blame the distributors. Tower Systems and Computerlink are compliant and have been for years. POS Solutions is not and has not been. Don’t blame other people for your lack of interest in newsagents. You have had it within your power to deliver compliant software. My company and Computerlink are proof of that.
Tower Systems software does not require newsagents to restructure their data daily. They can, if they wish for efficiency, reindex and that usually takes no more than five minutes. It’s optional. You know that because I wrote to you about this a year ago when you were spreading misstatements to newsagents about it.
I challenge you to a public debate on this with newsagents and distributors present. Let our community decide who is telling the truth on this. Like every other public comparison between our two companies and their products I expect you to refuse.
Mark, like your employee that was mentioned in your post, titled “When people move on..” I could not stand being in the same room as you. You treat your customers like your employees, use them then spit them out.
The requirement to reindex the data within your software each and every day as clearly detailed in instructions you provide to your customers. It is proof that your software and the data base used is out dated and should never be sold. I ask other readers of this blog if they have every heard to software that you had to perform major reindexing each day in an attempt to restore the system from major crashes.
I will think about your offer of a public debate over night. Maybe it is about time we put the real facts on the table about the reason you have just had to change the database engine of the software. How many have you upgraded with the new database engine? What about the poor newsagent that purchased their tower system only a matter of months ago? You sold them a dud! Zac
Zac, this thread is about the non-compliance of your software with well established newsagent channel standards. Try as you might to make this about Mark Fletcher the person, nothing can take away from the facts: your software does not comply with the standards, ours does; you sold your DOS software, as recently as a year and a half ago knowing it was not compliant and now you say you will not make it compliant.
Your personal attack speaks volumes.
For the record, again, Zac, there is no requirement on users of Tower Systems to undertake a major re-index every day. You are clutching at straws if this is all you have against me and my company.
I treat my customers like colleagues. This is one reason I bought a newsagency and have given willingly of my time to help newsagents. That aside, the numbers speak for themselves. I’ll show you mine if you show me yours. Many more aggrieved POS Solutions have switched to Tower in the last two years than the other way.
Let me know when you are available for the public debate.
Mark
Fiction!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!1
This conversation with my name is a fiction. It does not sound like me at all, just for the record on September 12, 2006 04:13 PM, I was in a meeting sorting out a clients concerns, no where near a computer and could not have filled out this form.
Also I suspect too reading the so-called zac reply that it does not sound like him either and he probably did not fill it out either.
Probabily someone is pulling your leg Mark and fell for it.
Your software can give us the IP address of the person logging in and we can prossibly track him down?
Oops I should have said that probabily someone is pulling your leg Mark and *you* fell for it.
Anyway what is the IP address and I will see if we can track him down because its not funny.
Bernard,
Comments here are not moderated. If those purporting to be from you and Zac are false then maybe you would care to publish your views on the matters under discussion. I am sure many readers here would like to know what you think about the substance of the discussion – the compliance or otherwise of your DOS and Windows software.
Mark
WELL ZAC HAS NOT REPLIED TO ANY OF THIS, SOMEONE ELSE IS POSTING ON HIS BEHALF WITHOUT PERMISSION. ZAC WAS AT A CONFERENCE WHEN THIS WAS POSTED AND WE CAN PROVE SAME. THE POSTINGS DO NOT REFLECT ZAC’S OPINION AND ARE WRITTEN FALSLEY ON HIS BEHALF AND WITHOUT PERMISSION
No owrries Stacey. Maybe you could get Zac, Michael or Bernard to respond with their views on the core issue under discussion – compliance. I am sure readers here would be interested to know what the Directors of POS Solutions think about this. Mark
Hiding behind the issue by saying its an unmodulated site!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Okay what I think about this? Well I never said it and now it clear that Zac did not either! Both of us can bring up witnesses to prove it. So it was someone else that said it with our name.
Obviously this person or persons knows a lot more then the average reader. He knows that ACCC made you send out a letter admitting that you had behaved “in misleading and deceptive conduct” that went out in August 2005, that you need to restructure a tower bases which takes half an hour daily on a tower site (something I did not know about till I read it), that your documentation states that a user has to re-index daily and that you only changed your database in the last few months. This all suggests a person who knows a lot about the tower systems.
Why? What is the motive. Well I see two possibilities.
1) This whole conversation is a lie.
2) That someone is pulling your leg Mark and you have been *duped* by someone that *really* knows his tower stuff.
If you released the IP address, we may be able to share some light as to which one it is. At the very least we will have the location and ISP of the person or persons that did it.
I refer the reader to
http://www.networkingfiles.com/PingFinger/Neotraceexpress.htm
http://www.networkingfiles.com/images/html/pingfinger/neotrace1.htm
Bernard,
While you say that neither you nor Zac posted the material you seem to support what has been said. You also repeat the false information.
With our software re-indexing is not required daily nor does it take half an hour. You and I have discussed this several times in the last year when I have been seeking to have you re-educate your sales team about such false comments being made. For you to suggest you just found out about this is false.
As for the letter I sent to newsagents at the request of the ACCC. This is on the public record. You, like the earlier correspondent is very selectively quoting from the letter. I note you do not quote the information, approved by the ACCC, which documents how newsagents feel about Tower Systems company to POS Solutions. If you are going to refer to something like this Bernard, refer to the whole document as your selective quoting speaks volumes about your business practices.
I am happy ot release the two IP addresses for the comments. They are:
202.173.185.64
203.34.248.95
In the meantime, rather than making your comments about us, why not get back to the original topic – the non-compliance of your DOS and Windows software.
The offer of a public debate remains on the table.
Mark Fletcher
What I did was repeat the information as in the conversation. As I stated much of the information was new to me as well.
As far as the IP addresses are concerned, I will reported them for scams to their respective ISP and also to
http://www.scamwatch.gov.au/
202.173.185.64
The first one, which was alledgely made by me, is located in Perth Western Australia. I was in Victoria.
203.34.248.95
The second one was made in Melbourne, Vic which was alledgely made by Zac, Zac at the time was in NSW.
Bernard,
None of the information is new to you. You have been told many times about re-indexing and that it takes 3 to 5 minutes. You continue to ignore this and allow your people to spin their way.
I’ll take your silence on the compliance issue as acceptance of my position.
I’ll also take your silence on the debate invitation as rejection – disappointing because newsagents might finally have had the transparency they crave.
Mark
All this shows that the information this alleged person or persons had was unlikely to have been by simply a smart reader.
They would also have had to have some sort of organization to post from Perth in Western Australia and then from Victoria. So ruling out one person. We have what looks like a team.
As far as the rest of your post is concerned, I think its a discussion for another forum. As I said to you before Mark, the place to go for information on towers systems is to towers and the place to go for information on Pos Solutions newsagency management software is at Pos Solutions.
Bernard,
For several years you have put out spin to your customers about, among other things, compliance. A few weeks ago you acknowledged to your customers, for the first time from what I am told, that your Windows software is not compliant.
Newsagents deserve better than this. My view is that no software should be available to newsagents unless it is compliant. It is like selling an unroadworthy car.
Say yes to the public debate and demonstrate preparedness to publicly support your position. I’d be glad to participate. Yes, it is a risk. We owe it to newsagents.
You cannot rely on VANA doing your promotion work for you.
Mark
I am a regular reader of this blog and find alot of Mark’s comments interesting, especially in this post. However, knowing the IP address as to which someone made the post means nothing. There are many ways as all of you guys should know(I’d think!) working for a software company of faking an IP address making it seem that you are in a different location and/or country. I think you’ll find it’s not a “team” making these posts, but someone spoofing their real IP, still traceable but much harder. If you wish to use unregulated posting and you have over 2000 hits per day(Think I read this earlier), this will eventually be a mess. I’d like to see this blog have a member login service so that this does not continue to happen.
We just turned comments back on last week. The plan is to assess the situation in a few weeks and decide whether we should move to a membership approach.
In answer to Steve’s remarks, I certainly found Mark’s comments here interesting but not entirely accurate. Compliancy is not a yes or a no. There are degrees of compliancy. If we were not compliant then our clients could not use Xchangeit.
Also I think the facts are that unlike Tower systems, our users still use and operate their old DOS system. Our second and third newsagency users still use their DOS system. In fact our third user is still using the equipment that we sold him almost 13 years ago. How many tower users can say that? I can remember talking to Turbonaps users that complained that no GST was available so they had to go to the windows system.
However the bit that really annoyed me was that we would waste money on lawyers. Considering how much Mark has costed both of us with his legal case.
http://tinyurl.com/hc5zj
Where Mark had his appeal dismissed with costs.
If you think that such cases are cheap believe me they are not even if you get costs.
As far as the issue that about the IP address. Well assuming that Mark is telling the truth about these IPs, then you ask is it possible to fake an IP address. Well I am no expert on this but I do know a little about it. A website gets, as you say, plenty of hits. It has to throw messages to heaps of people all together. So it sends a pack of information to a location (the IP address), a packet to that one and that one and so on. This information is going though many different paths though the net. I don’t see how it can be faked but anything is possible. I suppose you would have to be really good and I mean really good to do such a thing.
The other issue are these IP recorded as there are so many of them. The answer is probably yes. In these days where storage is so cheap most of these things are recorded by the ISP. The net is not anonymous as many people seem to think and its getting less so, all the time. If you for example posted a message here saying that a bomb was on flight 762 leaving from Perth today at 9:10am. That plane blew up. The police then decided to track down the message, I am sure that they could track you down pretty quickly. I am talking a few hours.
Your last remark do I think that this blog should have a member login service so that this does not continue to happen. I think yes and I welcome Mark’s recent comments.
Bernard,
You demonstrate unaccountability by only talking about a fraction of an issue, any issue.
I agree that your software can process invoiced sent by magazine distributors through the XchangeIT gateway. This, of itself, does not demonstrate compliance. You to bnot send back sales data and you do not send back EDI Returns data. We have been sending sales data for three years and EDI Returns data for well over a year.
Get with the program Bernard as the longer you hold your customers back the greater the finncial cost to them.
You and your company are the barrier. Tower Systems and Computerlink have proved that the standards work.
So, all your bluster aside, the core issue remains. Your software is not compliant and only you can fix this.
Mark Fletcher
i have read all of the comments listed here with interest. The issue of compliance is not one to be taken lightly. I have been, and am still, a huge believer in a National Standard that must be adhered to, not just with software but our whole industry, otherwise we have nothing to benchmark our industry against. Bernard, if a national standard/compliance is introduced by the ANF, and it will be, will Pos Solutions adhere to it? The same question for Mark, will you adhere to a National standard/compliance when it is implemented by the ANF? I see part of compliance as being able to electronically send data, including returns to our industry partners, sales data, invoices etc, as listed earlier by ‘Casper’, and this would be only a small part of being Nationally Compliant. Our industry needs to be seen as being as professional as possible in the way it conducts itself with its industry partners, including the way in which software companies treat their industry partners, newsagencies. If we are not all working together to achieve a common goal, and i mean being Nationally compliant, then we will simply go down the same road as the UK market, none of us will have a job!
Vaughan,
Tower Systems has delivered on-time on every standard thrown at us by every player in my 25 years as ownership of this company. I don’t see us diluting our commitment to newsagents and newsagent suppliers.
It would be inappropriate for the ANF or any Association to set standards as they are not involved in the transactions at the heart of commerce with newsagents nor do they have the resources required.
My view is that the current approach need not change other than for one IT company, POS Solutions, to actually deliver on the standards. The current standards have been transparently developed and do serve many newsagents and suppliers well.
Tower Systems and Computerlink users are compliant with magazine, newspaper, stationery, greeting card and tobacco standards. In the case of Tower we provide a 30+ page compliance document to all of our customers to support pursuit of standards in store.
Mark Fletcher
It is alarming that Mark Fletcher feels so insecure that he has to public attack his competitor. This is one of the reasons I have supported POS for 10 years, it demonstrates a “lack of integrity, and dignity”.
My interest is newsagents. They need compliant software and NOT spin.
Mark, you have more spin than Shane Warne! There is no need to pretend that you don’t.
To show Mark your commitment to integrity, and dignity, I suggest that you allow me to get an independent internet expert in to check your website control and the blog to confirm these IP addresses you supplied. It clear from the discussion that there is enough public interest in this question to justify this.
Now let’s get back to the real world. As far as Xchangeit is concerned, I reckon NETWORK = 50%, GG = 40% and RDS = 10%. With this in mind we have had heaps and heaps of discussions with NETWORK on this issue. What is the real issue of the compliant software? What are you looking for? What do you need? Etc etc etc
This is what the people in NETWORK responsible for the project told us “we only receive 5% of sales data in a timely fashion. Newsagents are 45% accurate compared to supermarkets who are 90-95% accurate. For us as distributors to provide more accurate quantities to our retailers, we need a much higher degree of accuracy. So at this stage it would be the supermarkets that get more accurate distributions and less returns because they are able to provide us with better accurate scanned sales data.”
From NETWORK from what I gather is that most newsagents are not on Xchangeit. Most of those that are on Xchangeit are not sending data. Those that are sending data though Xchangeit, most are only sending a small part of the data. The majority that is being send down is wrong and I will not mention what system is sending the worst data down.
So the reason NETWORK have not gone further down this track is they have supermarkets like COLES, which I am sure are sending down 100% of data in a timely fashion with about 95% accuracy while newsagents are sending down about 5% of data in a timely fashion with about 45% accuracy. Do the maths yourself!
From GG, we hear a different story that the data is good and that they are really using it. They want more of it. It’s interesting that many newsagents on posbrowser that are sending data are reporting that GG supplies have improved. I have been seriously thinking of turning off NETWORK’s data, as its no point and just concentrating on GG.
RDS are being secretive to us but I gather that they are just starting off on this path.
From what I see, the fragmented nature of the Newsagency industry that hurts us all at the front counter is also hurting in the back office with issues like this too. If all newsagents were owned by one organization which is where Vaughan is leading too, I am sure that with this professionalism would also be 100% of the data coming down with 95% accuracy too but now we drift into another subject………….
Bernard,
The reality is somewhat different to what you paint. Gotch, NDD and Network are all live with EDI Returns. NDD is the most advanced followed by Gotch. Both have hundreds of newsagents online. For a newsagent to be live with EDI returns they have to be judged as compliant at the store level. This means on time and accurate sales data. So, this means that hundreds of newsagents are at this point. With Gotch we know that 95% of these compliant newsagents are Tower Newsagents. I do not have the data for NDD but expect it to be well over half. On Network, they are moving more slowly than the others but we know that Tower Newsagents are compliant and will be first on their EDI returns project.
Spin as you might, compliance including sending sales data and EDI returns is being achieved by many newsagents – mainly Tower Newsagents and Computerlink Newsagents.
The only barrier to POS Solutions users achieving the fruits of compliance is your failure to deliver DOS and Windows software which meets current standards. Nothing can detract from your failure in this regard. You have made choices and the consequences are that your customers are missing out. Bernard, that can be fixed. All it takes is investment on your part in your DOS and Windows software.
On your comment re the IP addresses, those I posted here are accurate.
Mark Fletcher
As you claim that IP addresses are accurate, I tend to agree with Steve here that its probably one person so two different IP addresses in different states is most suss. There is now no reason not to allow an independent internet expert in to check your website control and blog to confirm these IP addresses you supplied. It clear from the discussion that there is enough public interest in this question to justify this. When and what dates and time are a good day for him to come?
On the second issue, you raise of returns which was not the subject of my post you quote a figure of hundreds of newsagents mainly tower sites doing it. Say this figure was right. This proves NETWORK’s point. Both towers and computerlink are only in a minority of sites in newsagencies, of that only a small percentage of tower sites do it and a smaller percentage still, of computerlink users do it. Makes me admire these brave people these are when on their Weekly Newsagent DARTboard Report with an average accuracy of the sales data is 45%, rushing to do electronically the returns?
Our electronic returns development is going nicely. Its being checked and checked and checked. We don’t care if we are not first just as long as its right. Any posbrowser user wanting to get on the program to start using it now let me know.
Bernard,
The IP addresses are as I published here but they are not the issue. The issue is your inability and or refusal to provide compliant software to your DOS and Windows newsagent clients.
Between Tower and Computerlink we have, I estimate, 60% of all computerised newsagents. My assessment is that you have 32% of newsagents with a computer system. That Tower and Computerlink users are sending accurate sales data and are embracing EDI returns is testament to the teams in our respective businesses and the training and support provided to our customers.
In my own shop I have been running EDI returns successfully and with all the benefits for well over a year. So, it’s not new technology. The sooner you deliver this to your DOS and Windows user community the better for them. You have had these standards in your hands for close to two years – such a delay in implementation is disrespectful.
Mark Fletcher
1) The IP addresses are an extremely important issue. Your refusal is noted. I ask myself why?
2) How do you derive your estimates of computerised newsagencies?
3) 45% accuracy is accurate! You must be using some strange defination of the word *accurate* that I am not aware of.
4) If out of 60% of computerised newsagents only a few hundred are using it, how is this a testament to any one?
Bernard,
You can believe me or not re the accuracy of the IP addresses I published here. That is not the issue. The lack of compliance of your DOS and Windows software is the issue.
My estimate of the number of computerised newsagents is based on the database I have of newsagents and the systems they run.
I don’t care about the network DartBoard accuracy – it’s rubbery at best. What matters is the number of newsagents sending sales data and what the companies think about the quality of the data. Since neither of the newsagents software packages from your company send back sales data what do you care? The reality is that distributors tell us they trust data from our systems and want more of it to plan print runs and for other uses.
The magazine distributors are controlling the update of EDI Returns. To go from zero to 211 with Gotch is a few months is excellent. This will dramatically grow now that the benefits for newsagents, the distributor and the publishers have been quantified. You are welcome to join this party – all you need to do is provide compliant software for your DOS and Windows users.
Mark Fletcher
I have had enough of your circular arguments.
The IP addresses your refusal is noted. I still ask myself why?
Let me just add that our windows system posBrowser can and does send back sales data for ages now. What is interesting to me is that you parade yourself as an expert on computerized systems in newsagencies and yet don’t know that!
Bernard,
No circular arguments here. This thread is only about the non compliance of your DOS and Windows software.
I am certain that users of your Windows software will be pleased to hear that they can now send sales data just as the magazine distributors will welcome your movement on this. I call it movement because suppliers and newsagents agreed just three weeks ago that your software was not sending sales data back.
Mark Fletcher
Mark, I understand that this thread is about the non-compliance of POS Solutions(I like Tower personally) but in blogs threads can and do easily change into other topics as this one has. It doesn’t mean the original topic should not continue to be discussed, but in my opinion I think that the IP addresses in question should be investigated due to the fact that they pretend to represent a company(POS Solutions). I think you’ll find it’s a disgruntled employee, more likely an ex-employee of yours or POSS. Having said that though, I don’t think you could track him/her down, and what could be done if you did?
Please, make this a member only login, the IP address then does not matter at all and these problems will not come up again.
Steve,
We’ve checked the IP addresses using various means and have some theories but, as you say, to what end?
As I noted a few posts back we just turned comments on and will assess in a week or two. I’m inclined to agree with you on this seeing the anonymous postings.
mark