John Linton .....in many circumstances outside their marriages or personal relationships.
I had a long conversation with one of our major suppliers yesterday afternoon which is unusual for me as I seldom, if ever, answer my work telephone unless it's an internal call and keep my mobile permanently switched off. It's probably an anti-social attitude but I view my mobile as a tool to use when I need to make a call and don't see why I should have my life interrupted by people randomly calling me and interrupting whatever I am doing at any time. Selfish - but a habit I have developed over the years. So the number of telephone conversations I have with business contacts are virtually zero as I have always regarded business discussions are conducted via email as the written word makes people more careful as to what they 'promise' and there can be no mistake as to what has been said - by either party.
Yesterday's conversation was about 'exclusivity' which is becoming more common in contract requirements at this time compared to at any time I have noticed in the past. Despite many 'requests' by suppliers for 'exclusivity' in buying various products over the years of Exetel's existence we have steadfastly refused to ever contemplate such restrictions for all of the obvious reasons and a general dislike for such constraints. Overwhelmingly the reason for never entering into 'exclusive' contracts is you give away any future 'flexibility' in 'discussions'. At this particular time things are continuing to change so quickly that any type of 'exclusivity' is almost suicidal. My most obvious point was that this particular supplier also sells services to other ISPs who have their own, limited, DSLAM networks in the most 'popular' exchanges and by definition would always use their own equipment for the majority of sales so why were they 'demanding' exclusivity from Exetel when clearly that was not a requirement when they sold services to our competitors? There was, of course, no answer to that other than the mindless mumbling of "being unable to discuss commercial in confidence aspects of their dealings with other wholesale customers".
My personal business experience over quite a considerable time is that I have never see any 'exclusive' arrangement ever benefit the buyer and my personal experience is that it only ever disadvantages the buyer almost immediately it is entered in to. In market conditions that exist today it would be suicidal for any buyer to be locked in to only dealing with a single supplier for a single service let alone for a range of services. I feel the same way about 'volume commitments in defined time periods'. Why do suppliers ask for such commitments when both the buyer and the seller know that the buyer does not have any control over their ability to guarantee to deliver such volumes in marketplaces like today's residential ADSL sectors? I suppose the generic answer is that the 'marketing' parts of suppliers presume that 'exclusivity' and 'minimum net adds' will produce some sort of guarantees that a properly priced product won't....or something along those lines. I can't see how that can possibly be the case but then I have never been in one of those positions.
So it appears we, and they, have wasted a large amount of time pursuing an agreement that could never have been possible. Pity we can't learn to communicate better but it's too late now.
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