A tale of woe and new suppliers

I gave up....

[Essex_boy]

Recently found a supplier 12 miles from my home, have top selling products and well known brand.

Thursday - Visited them for a discussion on products etc informed all my purchases will be cash and fairly small. No problem.

Friday sales going well I call in for 4 cases of stock - Cant open account even for cash as the cash office isnt open.

Sat/Sun - take a small fortune for their products.

Monday (Today) - Call in again with sorry cant deal with you without proof of trade status.

Result - refunded all orders and gave up.

I have never ever come across a firm so unhappy to take cash and serve a customer.

Anyone else?

[martyt]

Seems like maybe you got the cart before the horse... Might have been prudent to have the account established and the product onhand before taking orders...

Being on the wrong side of the pond, I'm not sure what you mean by "proof of trade status" - in the states, most wholesalers require you to furnish them with your state tax ID number before they'll talk to you. Only legitimate businesses can get a state tax ID number, so they know at that point that they're dealing with a real company and not some random customer who should be paying retail.

But even so, most businesses I've dealt with are happy to take cash from anybody who walks in the door. Sometimes there's a surcharge, but they'll still do business.

Is there absolutely no way to get an account established (whether it's a cash account or net 30 or whatever) with this supplier? Seems like you're losing out on a lot of potential revenue and the ability to quickly respond to customer orders having the supplier so close. Might be worth your time to be persistant with the supplier until they see the light...

[Macro]

In the IT business in the UK you'd need a lot more to setup an account with some distributors. Typically it's an account application form, two years worth of audited accounts, bank account number and sort code, two trade references, a copy of your letterhead, your VAT number, and various other bits and pieces. Some of them will get lost and you will produce copies. Then they'll lose the copies and the deadline will pass (as you have to fulfil all the criteria within a certain period). So you start again and get together another set....

Some of them will require you to provide your business plan, management accounts and historic sales breakdowns and stats. We need to have stuff like that as every Tom, Dick and Harry claims to be a big business but many of them are crooks and conmen. They'll order 200 hard disks and when the boxes arrive they'll put in a claim saying the boxes were full of old newspapers. Taking a hit on the odd dishonest customer trying that on with a single hard disk is OK. Taking the same hit with someone who has the capacity to buy a million quid's worth of stock puts my entire company at risk.

That's how it is. You have to live with it I'm afraid.

[Essex_boy]

yeah it was only toys though, Ive been to places where I turn up with a bundle of cash and they are only to happy to see you.

Some even offer a discount for cash, oh well I really cant be bothered to jump through hoops - plenty more where this one came from.