But as one partner said, a free trip to Nashville does not seem to be a fair exchange as the Florida trip  was an announced prize. There's a view that the real reason for the view is cost cutting. But the main thing happening is that the company's credibility with its channel is heading down. This has not been a good month for relationship building. The channel is still reeling from an October 28 "all-hands" telephone call with Pascal Houillon, CEO of Sage North America that had been advertised an hour-long event, but ended up lasting 20 minutes (well some say 15). Many thought it was a chance to get to know Houillon and Miller said these kinds of events are important to the CEO. It's just that it was a matter of setting expectations. Those certainly weren't met as VARs I've heard from thought what was discussed in the brief event was not worth the effort. Look on the bright side--it's not going to be hard to exceed expectations next time. And as to the Tennessee two-step event shuffle? To quote one reseller: "Other partners are also questioning this as the latest in a string of stumbles: Fuzzy Partner re-cert, cutting support allocations, Branding, All hands 15 minutes partner call. What's in dispute is not really so much the policy changes as the poor communication."