SITA rolls out 21-day payment policy

AHMEDABAD, INDIA: After a long discussion with its members, the South Gujarat Information Technology Association (SITA) has decided to put in place a payment policy throughout the region.

According to SITA members the economic recession in the market had prompted them to take such a strong stance.

Speaking about the new policy, Chetan Desai, President, SITA said, “Previously the procedure for collecting payments from customers for system integrators (SI) as well as traders was haphazard. Some customers used to take 35 to 40 days to clear payments. Most of the times the shop owners had to go to the customers place to collect the money or cheque. Now all our members have decided to fix duration to clear the payments. We advised SIs to collect the amount against the delivery on the spot.”

Speaking about the economic crunch Desai further added, “Apart from the problem of collecting payments, the economic crunch which has impacted Surat as well, is another hurdle we have to over come to ensure our businesses survive. Every body knows that diamond, textile and share market have been adversely affected, and now the IT market is the next soft target. So we decided to set up a payment policy where the receiver of the product has to clear the payments within fixed dates against the delivery.”

As per the payment policy, SITA members will get 21 days credit period while non-SITA members will have to clear their payments within 15 days.

During the general body meeting, SITA members also decided to tackle the service related problems. According to partners, vendors take 35 to 40 days to replace products. “We will talk to the companies who are directly interacting with vendors to solve the problem of delay in product replacement. If the vendors don’t support us we may consider boycotting that particular company,” said Desai.