[quote] To conclude then, as my point has once again been missed:
I followed the instructions given to me by CS Staff. After following those instructions and bringing them two new customers i am then told that i am currently breaking their license agreement and must join the Reseller group - THIS is why i was pissed![/quote]Hi Willow,
No misunderstanding at all. I’ve said from the start that I wish CS-C would go ahead and take care of the few remaining license conflicts that apparently overlap the end of the open reselling and authorized reseller program. Just so you know, I ran into this EXACT problem with CS-C, but I elected to go ahead and join the reseller program. I did this because I feel very strongly that CS-Cart is the best cart for the price, and even though hosting and selling shopping carts aren’t the foundation of my company, I view the buy-in as a wise investment that will result in a substantial profit.
I do appreciate that CS-C has chimed in here with the final word on the situation, but I support your side on transferring this one license. Perhaps they will do it privately. I’ll keep my fingers crossed.
As to the reseller program itself, I am very appreciative they finally took the steps to create one. First of all, if you’re going to let independent agents sell your product, it’s important to know who is out there peddling your products. It is critical to make sure IA’s aren’t out there making promises that can’t be honored. A formal reseller program is a conduit between the the company and IA that can be used for training, protected communications, product news & events, and a method to terminate an IA for breaking the rules. You’re up to your ears in this problem, but it’s also a great example of how it’s nearly impossible for a non-authorized person to sell the product.
I know you and Jesse want to help out a friend, or aren’t interested in selling carts at a profit, and on the surface that seems to be pretty harmless, but it’s not. It diminishes the value of the product, and reduces selling to nothing more that a price war. That hurts everybody. If you look at the post from the Admin, you’ll note that he’s hinting that a price increase is possible. I’d bet the farm that it will happen. However, I don’t think there considering it because they want to buy a million dollar condo, it’s because they need to bring in more people and resources. They may be new to capitalism, but the Russians have taken to it like white on rice. They know what it takes to keep the doors open. Part of the process is making sure you have a quality dealer network. Letting anyone that just wants to pass a license at cost is a sure fire way to a mountain of problems. Problems that will take up resources that could be doing something more constructive.
I don’t look at the buy in as being a $475 expense, I see it as a $500 net. That’s a good margin and one I would want to protect against circumstances like yours and Jessie’s from becoming a regular occurrence. CS-C is doing the only reasonable thing it can to insure that it has a dealer network that will represent the product well, and not reduce it to a price war. I hope they continue the practice. CS-C is still a bargain at $195 and shouldn’t be offered for any less. Both you and Jessie are quite open about wanting to provision someone with CS-C for $115, (and I still believe you should be able to do it with that one license), but if you remove the names of the people you want to sell to, the result is that you’re selling licenses for $115.
So what happens if you run across someone who wants to buy a license? You can send them to CS-C, or to a reseller (who will likely pay you a referral fee). Decide if you’re a reseller or not? Seems simple enough. But if you decide you’re not a CS-C reseller, then the best thing you can do is to send people to CS-C or an authorized reseller. They won’t have any provisioning headaches, they’ll get access to the help desk, and they’ll get tech support.
[quote] @MikeK - no offence was taken at all mate and certainly none was implied or intended by me 
Theres nothing like a great debate 
[/quote]Same here. It is a good debate.
