South Korea's subcontract environment is improving steadily as the government clamps down on unfair practices, a poll carried out by local businesses showed Sunday.

The poll carried out by the Fair Trade Commission on some 100,000 businesses this year showed both contractors and subcontractors saying violations have declined compared with 2014.

The antitrust watchdog checked 24 categories of subcontract law violations covering such areas as delayed payment, failure to issue formal paper contracts and arbitrary return of products, and found they had all declined.

The poll on prime contractors showed only 25.9 percent saying they have been cited for breaking unfair rules, down 3.3 percentage points from last year's 29.2 percent.

Among subcontractors and vendors that have business ties with these prime contractors, the percentage of unfair transactions they experienced in the course of the year fell to 49.1 percent from 57.2 percent.

Broken down by type of offenses, payment-related violations committed by contractors dipped 5.3 percentage points to 33.8 percent in 2015 from 39.1 percent. Payment-related offenses, which cover delayed payments, outright withholding of payments and unfair promissory note discounts, are the single largest complaint raised by subcontractors.

In the realm of unfair cancellations of contracts experienced by subcontractors, the percentage of violations dipped to 5.2 percent from 7.8 percent, while unilateral changes to existing contracts fell to 7.2 percent from 8.4 percent.

The survey also showed the percentage of prime contractors returning products that they bought and demanding refunds falling to 2 percent from 3 percent last year.

On other positive changes that have occurred in the past year, 60.1 percent of subcontractors and vendors checked said they have received payment for products and services rendered in cash, up 5.3 percentage points from 2014. Of companies checked, 96.8 percent said their requests to mark up prices due to a spike in commodities prices were respected by their contractors, up from 92 percent last year.

The latest FTC poll then revealed that 75.6 percent of agreements signed between contractors and subcontractors conformed to standard contracts set by the government, although pharmaceutical companies and plastic manufacturers tended to be less inclined to follow the guidelines.

The FTC, meanwhile, said the latest gains reflected tough measures taken by the Park Geun-hye administration to crack down on unfair practices that hurt the interest of subcontractors.

Local subcontract laws were changed in late 2013 and again last year to make it harder for contractors to take unfair advantage of their superior positions to infringe on the rights of vendors and contract manufacturers.

From last year up till September of this year the FTC ordered contractors to pay 253.7 billion won ($222.8 million) to subcontractors for products and services they have received.

It said some 2,500 companies that have been cited for breaking subcontract rules have been ordered to conform to the law and make changes. Failure to do so could lead to stiff penalties, it said. (Yonhap)