Gremio believes that the legislation that regulates this activity should be reviewed to avoid inappropriate practices in the supply of vehicles under raffle.
The Prosecutor’s Office has received complaints from citizens who claim to have been deceived by not having received a vehicle, within a defined period, for which they delivered a sum of money to alleged companies, as part of programmed purchase schemes. This discomfort has also been transferred to social networks, such as Facebook, where there are groups in which information about possible scams is shared.
Faced with these problems that generate a negative image of the activity, which have been addressed in two recent articles of EL UNIVERSO, the Association of Scheduled Purchasing Companies regrets that the operation of certain companies or consortiums affects its partners who, according to its spokesperson, Mauricio Peña, work adhering to a code of ethics to guarantee that the client receives the correct information before signing a contract.
Why was this association created?
Aecop was established ten years ago with the objective of grouping companies for the programmed purchase of goods, mainly vehicles and homes; companies that base their activity on ethical principles, transparency, to guarantee clients, through technical and financial solvency, adequate compliance with contracts. Throughout these years, this organization has been established and is currently made up of five companies: Consorcio Pichincha, Casa Plan / Motor Plan, Global Plan, Chevy Plan and Compra Sigma. I can say that the companies that make up the association have placed approximately 120,000 cars over the years and 3,000 homes.
Aecop (Association of Scheduled Purchase Companies) is concerned and motivated to group companies that guarantee technical solvency and transparency towards their clients, because unfortunately in the market there are companies with practices that are not the most appropriate for this process, which are they are based in some way on non-transparent practices, on the generation of exaggerated expectations that are not finally met. This has affected the image of the activity as a whole.
For this reason, Aecop has a code of ethics, which its companies respect and practice, which is based, first, on the fact that companies have a sales force with employees in a dependent relationship, that is, they are their own employees, direct from companies and employees who are permanently trained and trained around this code of ethics, which is based on the principle of always telling the truth when selling. In such a way that clients do not have false expectations or false expectations are not generated and have full information regarding the conditions on which these contracts are based.
What are those inappropriate practices that you have identified of these organizations or companies that have been denounced or pointed out on social networks?
Aecop is concerned that some companies in the market generate with their sales force expectations higher than reality towards customers, that is, in order to sell the package, many companies or many sellers of these companies actually deceive customers and they generate a false expectation in the term of the deliveries of the vehicles and this generates discomfort in many people, because at the time of finalizing the delivery of vehicles or homes, basically vehicles, they do not find what was offered at the time of acquiring the package, the product that was offered to you.
On the other hand, we are concerned that there are companies that do not have sufficient financial solvency and we are concerned that at some point they may default on the commitments acquired with their clients.
In the articles that we have published, there are also citizen complaints about hand washing made by certain consortia, stating that since the vendors do not have a dependency relationship, there would be no co-responsibility of those businesses in the event of a problem.
We are also concerned that the sales force of many companies is based on the figure of freelance or sellers without a dependency relationship, that is, they earn based on the sale. And this generates pressure on these sellers to sell as they please, since their income is based fundamentally on the sales commission, when we believe that in this business, transparency in the sale is fundamental and that is why the companies that make up the Aecop are very concerned with ensuring that the sellers are employees who do not depend on the sale, but largely depend on the remuneration they receive. So there is no pressure on sellers to misrepresent the truth or to generate false expectations in the sale.
What reading does the union have on the controls of the State institutions to supervise this activity? Is an update of the legislation necessary?
The Superintendency of Market Power Control (SCPM) is an entity that regulates the practices used by companies regarding the promotion and sale of products. There is the Directorate for the Regulation of Deceptive Practices, which should be permanently monitoring the behavior and practices of companies. The Superintendency of Companies regulates the development of companies in general terms.
We do feel that there is an excessively flexible and open (legal) framework in this business. We feel that there is a need for regulation, that it does not exist in our country, that it does exist in other countries. That, for example, policies for compliance with contracts be determined, in such a way that clients who enter this process with legally constituted companies have the certainty that if for A or B reason a company does not comply with its contracts, it has the guarantee of a security policy for compliance with the contract. I believe that a regulation of this nature should be implemented in the country.
12,135 vehicles were placed in September, the highest sale so far in the pandemic
Could this revision of the legislation contemplate sanctions for those sellers who deceive the customer? In a past interview, an official from the Market Power Control Superintendency acknowledged that there is a legal vacuum to sanction these types of sellers.
We fully share the criterion of the mayor in the sense that certainly the companies that are in this business and that have this figure of (employees) commission agents generate a scenario prone to deception. For this reason, the dependency relationship has the objective of guaranteeing that these officials (employees) respond adequately to clients and thus there is no problem that some companies claim that the deception of clients comes from commission agents.
Businesses should be held accountable for what sellers offer.
On the other hand, the citizen must also be alert. What should citizens who are looking for a car or home and would like to access the programmed purchase modality take into account?
The fundamental recommendation we make is that clients ensure that they are dealing with formally established companies. Second, that they see the conditions in which the company is committed to the citizens, that they are absolutely clear.
Notice the fine print …
There should be legally authorized contract formats to ensure that companies sign contracts with transparent conditions and that there is no fine print.
Clients have to read the contracts properly. And these contracts should have very clear conditions. That is something that the companies that make up the association work on, so that the terms of the contracts are simple and transparent, so that citizens can perfectly understand what they are signing.
Second, we believe that it is essential that the delivery times of the goods are absolutely clear. There is a lot of opacity, I would say, in some companies, which involve the client and do not clearly tell them what the deadlines are to which they are committed.
There are companies that make up the association that have also been named in social media complaints. In general, what has happened?
We believe that the citizen must have clarity and, as I reiterate, that he is adequately aware of the conditions that are being proposed for the signing of the contract. There are also occasions when citizens for reasons A or B have made it difficult for them to comply with their commitments and claim non-compliance by companies. There have been cases in which once seated with the client it is found that there is a (financial) difficulty. There is also the client’s need to recover the resources that he has been contributing. In that regard, the contracts are absolutely clear and there is the possibility of a refund, but there is a penalty. The citizen must be aware that companies charge when a citizen terminates a contract, for administrative costs.
In general terms, we have been able to identify that many citizens are not adequately aware of the conditions of the contract.
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In that sense, in what time is the money returned to them? I ask this because there are citizen complaints from other companies about the late return of resources, until the total goods are delivered, that is, until after several years.
In the contracts of the companies that make up the association, a penalty and a return period are stipulated. The deadline does not correspond to the waiting time until the entire group completes the process of receiving the property, because that would be inappropriate. The companies that make up the Aecop have established penalties and reasonable terms. Many times when the citizen explains his situation, companies always seek to solve the return, with the aim of not affecting the interests of the citizens either. (I)
Mario Twitchell is an accomplished author and journalist, known for his insightful and thought-provoking writing on a wide range of topics including general and opinion. He currently works as a writer at 247 news agency, where he has established himself as a respected voice in the industry.
