Dual pricing from January
Retailers and the service industry must display prices in both euro and lira from January 1, Parliamentary Secretary Tonio Fenech has told The Times. The government was considering introducing compulsory dual pricing in the middle of next year, but the...
Retailers and the service industry must display prices in both euro and lira from January 1, Parliamentary Secretary Tonio Fenech has told The Times. The government was considering introducing compulsory dual pricing in the middle of next year, but the Cabinet took the decision earlier this week to speed up the process.
Mr Fenech said: "It's better to start earlier to give people adequate time to get used to the euro and to stabilise prices."
The euro is due to be introduced on January 1, 2008. Dual pricing will be in place for a minimum of six months after that date to make it more difficult for sellers to increase prices.
The government has already started the process of monitoring prices through an enforcement structure in an attempt to ensure that prices do not increase unnecessarily before the changeover. Mr Fenech said that to date there was no evidence of any attempts to do so.
This enforcement arm will operate throughout the dual pricing period and will have the power to issue administrative fines and penalties to defaulters.
Meanwhile, all government tariffs will be "smoothed downwards" in order to set an example. "We want to see this attitude also displayed by the private sector," he said.
The parliamentary secretary insisted that conversions will have to be carried out at the central parity rate established by the Central Bank, which is Lm0.4293 for every euro.
A spokesman for the National Euro Changeover Committee (NECC) stressed that vendors would not be required to change their cash registers and talks were being held with cash register importers to ensure assistance was on hand.
Officials from the NECC will be meeting with banks tomorrow to discuss the charges currently applied to foreign exchange in relation to the euro. "The role of the banks during the dual pricing period is crucial," the spokesman said.
The introduction of the euro, and the steps leading towards it, are being carried out under the Euro Adoption Act which has just received its first reading in Parliament.
A comprehensive information campaign on the changeover is to be launched next month and a helpline will be opened in the coming weeks.
The NECC has already published guidelines for traders who opt to display prices in euro as well as lira until dual pricing becomes compulsory on January 1.
The guidelines are available on the NECC website at www.euro.gov.mt