Lotto tickets and sweets to deliver changeover headache

Confusion among Lotto syndicates and the dreaded prospect of losing the penny sweet and the 10p lolly - these are some of the problems signalled by eager participants in Ireland's "euro town" project.

It is two years since Loughrea was signed up by Minister of State for Science and Technology, Mr Noel Treacy, for the experiment, and traders in the town have had varying experiences in preparing for the changeover next year.

At yesterday's National Euro Conference, attended by the EU Commissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs, Mr Pedro Solbes, Mr Leo McGuinness, award-winning newsagent of News 'n' Choose, predicted that newsagents and the retail sector would be "at the cliff face" in early 2002.

He identified a sense of humour as the most important requirement for colleagues and staff, and highlighted some of the simple problems.

With 150,000 individual items in stock, it took four months to complete dual pricing. But "how much do I charge for the penny sweet, one of the fastest moving products in my store?" he asked. "I could ask a similar question about the 10p lolly. Charging 13 cents is likely to cause buyer annoyance," he said, and would certainly "complicate the transaction" for his younger customers.

Undoubtedly, there will be price adjustments on certain items, as Mr McGuinness said he could not see the lottery ticket being sold at 95 cents per panel. Nor could he envisage people paying €1.27 for the morning newspaper for too long. He did get his own back on some of his "favourite suppliers" by requesting that they invoice him in euros, and he paid in same. "No problems so far," he noted.