34.5% of Large Distribution Suppliers in Gyeonggi-do Experience 'Unfair Trade'

[Asia Economy (Suwon) = Reporter Lee Young-gyu] It has been revealed that 34.5% of suppliers in the Gyeonggi region who trade with large distribution companies have experienced unfair trade practices.

Gyeonggi Province announced on the 7th that, based on a survey conducted from September 16 to November 22 last year targeting 383 companies supplying to large-scale distribution companies, 34.5% responded that they had experienced unfair trade or unreasonable demands.

Among the unfair practices experienced by suppliers (multiple responses allowed), the most common were the transfer of inventory burden and unjust returns at 18.3%. This was followed by forced unfair transactions (16.7%), unfair contract signing (13.6%), and unjust payment for goods (10.7%).

The distribution sectors where unfair trade occurred were large discount stores (46.7%), online shopping malls (28.2%), outlets (11.5%), department stores (9.1%), and TV home shopping (4.4%), in that order.

Among the suppliers who experienced unfair trade, 36.3% had attempted to respond. However, rather than actively asserting their claims or reporting and consulting, many cases involved concessions or acceptance of the distribution companies’ policies or guidelines.

After responding to unfair practices, 70.8% of suppliers reported experiencing disadvantages such as suspension of transactions (43.8%) or reduction of transactions (33.3%).

Looking ahead, the proportion of respondents who expressed willingness to suspend transactions or report when faced with unfair practices were 30.3% and 45.1%, respectively.

Notably, the willingness to report among companies that had already experienced unfairness (37.9%) was lower than the willingness to suspend transactions (30.3%) and report (49.1%) among those who had not experienced it.

This suggests that after experiencing disadvantages from responding to unfair practices, the willingness to take further action weakened.

For more active responses, the top areas identified for improvement were monitoring of unfair practices (37.3%), strengthening confidentiality for whistleblowers (32.6%), and expanding education on distribution laws and standard contracts (30.5%).

Based on the results of this survey, the province plans to focus on creating a fair trade foundation in the distribution sector through education, legal counseling, and continuous monitoring.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.