Why we need a trade association and why you should join
Often, people in the trade will ask this question, often coupled with or replaced by “why should we pay to be a member?” and, “what benefit do I get from the association?”.
Many people are looking for a material benefit, something tangible that they can see more of a return from than an outlay.
For most things, this may well be a perfectly reasonable way to look at a cost to your business but when it comes to an association membership, we would suggest that, on the surface at least, this may be the wrong way to look at membership of the WTA or indeed any trade association.
Strong Representation
The fact is that the government will call upon trade organisations, largely trade associations, for opinion on legislative change. The reason for this is that trade associations tend to be more impartial than a commercial organisation and have to represent the majority of their membership.
Due to this, the opinion that is gleaned carries more weight as it is more representative of an industry as a whole and, not just one company’s or, even a few companies' agenda.
This is why the WTA is a not-for-profit organisation and why it has no commercial interests whatsoever. Its sole aim is to represent the members and to present the members’ opinions to government and/or others.
In order to be as effective as possible in this endeavour, the WTA needs to have a credible membership in both volume or, number of members and also in the quality of those members. To those ends the subscription fee is extremely low to encourage membership and the Code Of Practice (COP) is simple and easy for any reputable repair business to adhere to.
The more members we have the greater influence and the more we can do for members.
Benefits
The effect of this is that the WTA is “in the loop” as it were with what is going on in government in respect to legislative change that can affect our members. In turn, this allows the TA to keep its members informed and advise them of any change that they may have to make to comply or, if they can avoid compliance, as it is not relevant and so on.
If there were no WTA this would not be possible and whilst there is no “material benefit” most people will realise that being aware of this and having an organisation fighting your corner is worth having.
Contract Work
The WTA is often approached by companies looking for service agents in certain areas of the country. Sometimes and, commonly on an almost weekly basis, this is for a specific region and normally once or twice a year by a company looking for much broader coverage, often nationally.
Because our members are pre-vetted for public liability insurance, adherence to the COP, legislative requirements and so on it is far easier for them to choose to contract WTA members as opposed to having to vet all of that themselves. It is therefore not at all uncommon to find that WTA members are selected in preference to other methods.
Some companies will even insist that their contractors are WTA members or they will not employ them. On this topic in order to clarify how this works in practice, the WTA is completely transparent.
When we receive an inquiry it will be answered by a list of all members in the postal area with a list of skillsets: laundry / cooking / refrigeration / gas / refrigerant gas
It is then down to the company that wishes to contract work which member, if any, that they choose to use and is suitable. We do not differentiate between members nor offer advice on who to use or attempt to steer work to any party, it is completely at the client’s discretion.
We will try to negotiate and acceptable base rate per call to work from however, this is not a set rate and any negotiations on rates beyond this point are a private matter between the client and the members.
Benefits
The effect of this is that members are liable to be first in line for selection for new or changing contract work and that all members are viewed on an even footing by potential clients.
The WTA’s role is to bring this to members and allow them to choose what does and does not suit individual members as WTA members are under no obligation to accept any contract at any time.
The more members that we have, the more approaches that we receive, as better levels of coverage by members makes it ever easier for potential clients to employ WTA members over other solutions.
Media
The WTA regularly deals with enquiries from the media, especially so when there is a story that breaks in relation to appliances and attention is focused on our industry. Members of the press are, just like government, looking for as unbiased, honest opinion as they can get.
As a part of the role that the WTA performs, it deals with this area and will do its level best at all times to get across the views of the membership at large. One example is that we steered BBC’s Watchdog program to several members, leading to WTA members being featured on national television.
Benefits
The benefits of this are far less well defined other that, the WTA doing this does assist in conversation with government as it becomes more “recognised” along with the obvious benefit of the members being promoted generally through various media channels.
Deals
The commercial reality of the competitive modern world is that substantial deals are difficult to achieve. This does not stop the WTA from trying to get deals for members that offer a direct financial benefit, such as insurances, fuel, and other items.
That said, we will negotiate on behalf of members to ensure compliance with both existing and upcoming legislation. For 2015/16 an area that we are focussed on is compliance with the new Consumer Rights Act 2015.
Conferences
Historically, the WTA hosted two conferences per year: the Autumn Meeting and the larger Spring Conference. These have been suspended since Covid but we do plan to revisit this in time.
The Spring Conference is one of, if not the, largest meeting for solely the domestic appliance trade held in the UK, regularly exceeding 150 attendees.
Benefits
The benefits of these meetings are that members have two fantastic opportunities to network with new people in the industry, catch up with old friends, and see new products.
Most people that attend these meetings come again, many never miss them. We think that tells you a lot.
Thank You
We passionately hope that you come to understand the importance of a strong trade association. Individually we are of little consequence, but collectively we represent the absolute best of our industry.
We need your support in order that we can support all that the WTA does.
Join the Association Today