The story which needs to be written about Bill Express is one about how an industry association sold its soul, cost its members tens of millions of dollars and walked away with a nice profit, only to sell its soul to the next in line.
Journalists need to be wary of the statements being made by the Australian Newsagents’ Federation about Bill Express. On this matter, the ANF is not acting as an association representing its members, it is acting as a commercial partner of several companies involved.
In 2003, the ANF entered into a commercial Heads of Agreement with Bill Express subsidiary Dialtime Pty Ltd. In doing this, it rejected an alternative newsagent owned phone recharge and bill payment offer. For the record, I note that I was not on the ANF Board at the time and I had no commercial involvement in either Bill Express or the newsagent owned alternative.
In the 2003 Bill Express / Dialtime agreement, the ANF agreed to promote the Bill Express, Dialtime and eftpos offers “to the exclusion of all other electronic pre-paid and eftpos offers”.
Last year, I approached the ANF about negotiating a better rate for newsagents. The ANF CEO told me that the ANZ offer was the best offer for newsagents. I did not accept that and proceeded to negotiate with several banks. The result was an offer from St.George which was substantially better than the offer from the ANZ.
In 2008, when the 2003 Agreement ended this year, the ANF entered into a commercial agreement around mobile phone recharge and merchant services from Suncorp and St.George banks. The St.George rates achieved by the ANF are the rates I negotiated. I’d note that my work on the St.George rates was pro bono – I did not seek nor am paid any fee for acquiring a new merchant or for transactions processed.
Not surprisingly, following its agreement with St.George and Suncorp, the ANF started talking down the ANZ rates and talking up their new commercial partners.
In today’s Age newspaper, ANF acting CEO (no announcement has been made yet about a change of status) Don MacAskill is quoted:
“A lot of newsagents are in a predicament, wondering do we get an alternative, will the platforms still be operating, ongoing,” said ANF chief executive Don MacAskill.
“We really are trying to keep our members informed of where things are at and, at the same time, still recommending or giving details of alternative service providers to try and fill the gap of some of the things that were originally facilitated by the Bill Express platform.”
This is where journalists need to ask questions. The ANF is not acting on behalf of members, it is acting in the interests of its commercial partners as it has done in the area of mobile recharge / bill payment since 2003. Journalists ought not quote the ANF as a representative body.
Journalists cannot treat the statements from the ANF about Bill Express as statements from an industry association. They are statements from a commercial body which profits from those it talks up. An association wold do what the Queensland Newsagents’ Federation is doing and listing all eftpos offers available to newsagents so newsagents can make their own commercial decisions. The ANF, instead, actively talks down the ANZ and Commonwealth Bank offers.
Some newsagenmts are so incensed at the poor representation by the ANF of member interests that they are resigning their membership.
I am conflicted, as the ANF often points out, because I own eziPass. eziPass is offered free to all newsagents. I do not make anything from transactions. The ANF knows this. eziPass is available free to any newsagent. Indeed, for one day a couple of months ago, the ANF endorsed eziPass in two communications. My conflict is nothing compared to the ANF conflict.
Mark, you are not conflicted as far as I’m concerned.
I’m not a member of the ANF and never have been. Watching their performance with the BE fiasco has put me right off them. They haven’t from what I’ve seen performed the way they should have in this situation.
They shouldn’t be talking to the media before they talk to newsagents. It’s quite poor that they don’t know that.
Hi Mark,
I note no reference from either ANF or VANA in their “bulletins” or press releases about holding national and state meetings to develop a uniform industry position and advice for all member newsagents.
I also note nothing co-ordinated in what the states and the national body are muttering.
Surely now is as good a time as any for these so called leaders to present a unified front on behalf of the industry or do we need another body to “pick up the wreckage”.
Regards,
Lorraine
I am resigning from the ANF. They have misled me on Bill Express and profited at my expense.
Hi, Mark,
since you’ve come up first with the Suncorp/St Geo deal , and ANF appeared later with a similar deal, I have a question:
Is ANF taking a cut from this eftpos scheme?
If it is, then the banks should differentiate non-ANF members as ANF should not be entitled to this share of business?
WHAT IS NEEDED IS FOR BILL EXPRESS TO LET EVERYONE KNOW TO WHOM MONEY WAS GIVEN DURING THE PAST 8 YEARS IN THE FORM OF KICKBACKS.THIS INCLUDES THE ANF NANA AND ANY ONE ELSE.ALL PARTIES WHO HAVE RECEIVED MONEY FROM BILL EXPRESS CANNOT REALLY RUN A COURT ACTION AGAINST BILL EXPRESS BECAUSE THERE IS A SERIOUS CONFLICT OF INTEREST.BILL EXPRESS WOULD KNOW THAT AND WOULD REALLY EXPLOIT THIS IN A COURT ACTION.
We will also be resigning from VANA/ANF.
We asked for advice on Bill Express 8 weeks ago regarding the $500+ monthly payment and were told to keep paying and wait for them to go into liquidation. The advice was not logical, because if they went down, then my payments were gone too. I found this blog and have been using it as a great source of information. We ran with our own instinct, stopped the direct debit, 2 payments ago, changed our Eftpos terminals over 3 weeks ago and it has been business as usual. Our business never missed a beat. We also joined the class action instigated by NANA
I have heard stories of newsagents who kept the faith with these bodies (ANF/VANA) now sending their customers to Safeway etc for phone recharge etc. $$$ walking out their doors. What a catastrophe!
VANA / ANF should be closed down. They have shown no leadership in this matter, and are as guilty as BXP with what is happening to Newsagents at the moment. Even if ANF pushed the BXP barrow initially, the new leadership should have had the foresight to break the arrangement and look after its membership when things started to unravel. Who paid their wages? Obviously not us!!!!
As business people we newsagents need to take a good hard look at ourselves for getting caught in this mess. Our eye should always be on our own business not on what the rest of the sheep are doing. Take Intralot as an example, how many Newsagents have actually done the sums to see what the payback period will be for the licence fee. How many customers / turnover does your business need to get a return on your investment? We need to understand what we are getting ourselves into.
Finally, I would like to congratulate and thank Mark for this blog, as it is far more informative than anything I have ever seen from VANA/ANF.
SECOND POINT FOR THE DAY:ARE WE REALLY INTERESTE TIN GOING DOWN THE PATH TO ALLOW PEOPLE TO PAY BILLS AT NEWSAGENCIES???IF YOU DO 200 BILLS PER MONTH AT $1.00 PER BILL, AT MOST YOU WILL MAKE $140.00 NETT ASUMING YOU PAY NO MORE THAN 30 CENTS IN THE DOLLAR TAX.THEN YOU HAVE TO ADD IN OTHER COSTS,EG ELECTRICITY,PHONE LINES,WAGES,POSTAGE,OR WHATEVER.CAN YOU REALLY SEE YOURSELVES DOING A MINIMUM OF 200 TRANSACTIONS PER MONTH????IF YOU ARE INT HE TOP TAX BRACKET WORK IT OUT YOURSELVES.REALLY YOU NEED A MINIMUM OF $2.00 PER TRANSACTION AFTER ALL FEES AND CHARGES TO CONSIDER IT.WHAT DO OTHERS THINK???
Helen, I do not know if the ANF is receiving commission from the deal I negotiated. I have asked the question and have not been given a satusfactory answer. Mark
CBA bank called me yesterday and when i said i went to suncorp they asked why and my reply was it was recomended by the ANF and after a little chuckle the person on the other end said didn’t you learn from the BXP deal ANF get there little cut if you sign with st george or suncorp .luckily for me the suncorp one ended up beiing a better deal for me
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cba person was right! how could you still be listening to the ANF’s recommendations!?
even if there wasnt a tower deal available i would sign up to a more expensive deal just to ensure the ANF didnt profit from me!
you are correct scott you would think people including myself would learn …
The only way not to let ANF profited from us using St George or Suncorp EFTPOS is to tell them that you are part of tower group and of course you must at least join EZIPAS.
The only way not to let ANF profit from us using St George or Suncorp EFTPOS is to tell them that you are part of tower group and of course you must at least join EZIPAS.
Mark,
As you are aware Ray Hadley from radio 2GB has taken up the matter of Bill Express, when i explained the situation to him in my shop yesterday he could not believe what has happened.
I like many others feel that we have been sold another dud where the newsagent works for peanuts for the benefit of someone like the ANF, lets face it if Bill Express and the ANF did not have a fall out on their commercial agreement i ask the question how many of us would know about this? I feel that the ANF may have a conflict of interest here whereby their commercial gain could be more important than that of its member newsagents.
I strongly advise every newsagent to lobby their radio stations like 2GB and forward any relevant information that may expose further conflict of interest, for too long we have been fed low margin labour intense scraps and told that this brings people to your store. This is true but at the end of the day it would be better if we had time to develop new ways of bringing customers to you with a better margin.
Colin, Thank you for bringing this to the attention of Ray Hadley. While I could not listen, I have heard that he gave the story a good run. This big story here is how a trusted industry association could put its own needs ahead of those of its members. mark
The journalists are looking. The Age Business Day reports this article …..No wonder BXP cannot pay its bills
IF CRAIG Crosbie is looking for the black hole in the Bill Express books, he need look no further than the company’s last annual report.
There, listed as a fee for auditing services and a review of corporate governance procedures, is a payment of $287 million to KPMG.
While KPMG, once the employer of former Bill Express chairman Michael Doery, did do rather well out of the Bill Express mess, Full Disclosure suspects that three extra zeros have been added to the payment in the annual report.