XchangeIT sent this fee increase notice to newsagents yesterday:
Dear Newsagents
There will be a slight increase to your XchangeIT fees with effect from 1st April 2021. This is the annual price increase planned for 1 July 2020 which we postponed due to COVID-19. It is now necessary to meet our ongoing costs.
Discounted Membership
As most of you are on this Discounted Membership, where the term begins on or after 1st April 2021, your next renewal invoice will increase from $250 to $255 including GST.
Base Rate Membership
For those of you on this Base Rate Membership, where the term begins on or after 1st April 2021, your next renewal invoice will increase from $535 to $540 including GST.
Benefits of XchangeIT
In FY2021 and FY2022, XchangeIT will continue to work hard to provide the best service for our members to bring operational efficiencies and to work on initiatives to ensure the newsagents industry remains competitive in the future.
- We will continue to help stores improve their performance measurement tests, with the aim of having as many stores as possible on the Ovato and IPS No Physical Returns programs, thus saving expensive freight and courier costs.
- We are working hard on the Tabcorp Terminal Connect Project, with several stores currently piloting this product. We will be providing more news in our March Newsletter re this product, so watch out for it in your inbox!
- We are currently organising National Newsagent Week 2021, with the aim of more consumers visiting your store with a positive impact on your revenue.
- We have increased the number of suppliers using the platform by adding Radicool Australia last month. We would like to add more suppliers in the coming year, thus saving you time and money by receiving electronic invoices which automatically update your POS.
If you wish to discuss any of the above, please call us on 1300 551 212.
Thank you
The XchangeIT Team
I deal with a lot of retailers in 10+ retail channels and newsagents are the only ones I am aware of being charged for these services.
Given that XchangeIT is supplier owned and given that it is effectively a mandatory tool of being a newsagent with magazines, I’d like the company levying the fees to make its financial statements available to newsagents for scrutiny.
It’s pretty ridiculous the price they charge, considering my accounting software costs about the same per year but is much more critical and time saving. They are charging a lot for something that can be done easily through a REST or GraphQL server and a bit of code in POS software or web app.
Magazine costs are getting to the point where it is worth looking at ditching XChangeit and suffer the consequences. Just look at the amount of errors still coming through with regard to pricing, barcodes and recall dates. Just one mistake can cost more time and possible undercharges than is made in a days magazine sales.