It means an EU seller has the right to sell his products to anyone within the 28 countries.

It does not mean an EU seller MUST sell his products to everyone in the 28 countries

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TT forbids his resellers to sell to people who not live in the country where they are reseller.

This is protectionism.

I think it's even illegal, but sorry, I'm not a layer specialist in EU laws.

So a traveler from Holland who is traveling in France may NOT order in France.
So a traveler from The USA who is traveling in Germany may NOT order in Germany.
So a traveler from The Germany who is traveling in New Zeeland may NOT order in New Zeeland.

and so on.....

My interpretation of this company rule of TT in Germany is this:

This means travelers may not travel outside of their own country.

Put emotion in the discussion:

Touratech hates travelers who travel!

No. Protectionism is when the Government puts rules in place to discourage or forbid imports to protect its own manufacturers, workers, farmers etc.

Whats more, every single country, every single government in the world practices protectionism. Every single one. This is hardly the place to complain about it.

So ... protectionism is (1) something that governments (not companies) do and (2) Its not only legal, its universal.

What private companies do as a matter of internal policy to protect different franchises cannibalising each other is not protectionism. Its completely normal for a company to guarantee a certain territory to a particular franchise. If you bought a McDonalds franchise, you would NOT expect McDonalds to allow another guy to set one up in the next building to yours, selling big macs at a cheaper price, would you? When you try to register your kid at a school, they absolutely have the right to say "you do not live in our territory - go to a different school that services your area". Again, its totally normal for that to happen.

Its life. Stop getting worked up about it. You don't have the right to demand a company supplies you with goods ON YOUR TERMS.

You DO have the right to take your business to a different company. I suggest you do that.

Well this is clearly rubbish - either you are a fool or you are deliberately not telling the truth. If you want the item shipped to France then you simply order at the Touratech France website. They don't care if you are a traveller from Holland or not. Its not relevant. You said in your first post that you don't want to order from the French website because its 4% more than in Holland, because you dont speak French and because you don't like their method of payment.

So the problem is YOU. Its YOU who doesn't want to order from the French website. How on earth can you justify saying a traveller in France can NOT order in France? You are talking total rubbish. I am not interested in defending Touratech by any means, but for crying out loud, this is a ridiculous complaint.

Touratech's business model is poor, outdated and not customer friendly. (1) We know all that (2) That does not make it illegal (3) You refusing to follow their system does not mean they are restricting you (4) Shop somewhere else and be happy.

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I a previous life I have been involved in working out the EU regulations specially selective distribution etc.

The answer above hits the hart of this "problem".

1) TT can sell whereever they want in the union.
2) They can not make a difference between customers from different countries.
3) Each filial or franchise is protected in their region or country as far as it concerns promotional and marketing activities.
4) No filial or franchise can refuse to sell to anybody but they can refuse to service (in this case sending the product) outside their region.
5) Fixed pricing is FORBIDDEN!! so the pricedifferences ar logic. 20 years ago you wouldn't notice, but nowadays on the WWW you see it. Price differences are also explainable, having an building and paying wages in Spain or in Holland is not exactly the same.

GRTZ,

JP

It is a common and legal dealership/franchise practice.

If a man walks in off the street and wants to buy the stuff in the window you need a pretty good reason not to sell to him. Unless you are an arms dealer his nationality is pretty much none of your business.

If the same bloke rings from outside your geographical area you can just refuse to ship there. I don't want the hassle of trying to send stuff I sell on e-bay to some place the postal service operates on a Jumble Sale system, so you can't deny a TT dealer the same choice.

Nothing to stop anyone with an EU passport or similar flying to Hamburg and going shopping at TT. Doesn't mean you'd want to when you can see how they take the ****, but I don't want to pay Norwegian prices either.


Andy