Traders, shoppers both welcome measure

Plans  to fine businesses which fail to display prices on goods met with the approval of shoppers and traders in Dublin's city centre yesterday.

Ms Veronica Monroe, who has sold fruit and vegetables for nearly 40 years in Moore Street, said traders on the street have always displayed the prices of their goods because it made good business sense.

"If you didn't have the prices up some people would ask you, but a lot would assume the stuff is too dear and they'd just keep walking," she said.

"I find most shops have the prices on things but some times you do have to go looking. But generally I would say it is much harder now to know what you are getting.

"It was easier years ago to keep an eye on your money and to know what you were spending".

Mr Gerard Scully, from Walkinstown, said the new law was a positive development. "I'm amazed we didn't already have it," he said.

"Since the euro came in prices have gone up, everyone knows that. And if there isn't prices on things it's very hard to work out by exactly how much.

"But like everything else you'll find a few people will be fined and then it will all be let slip in the long run".

Mr John O'Rourke, from Ashbourne, Co Meath, said when he recently tried to buy mobile telephone accessories a number of stores he visited did not display the prices.

"I had to ask the guy behind the counter a few times how much various things cost and he acted like he was doing me a favour telling me. After a few minutes I got fed up and went somewhere else. At the end of the day if the shops haven't got the prices they'll lose out because people want to know where they stand".

Ms Pauline O'Sullivan, from Tullamore, Co Offaly, said supermarkets often did not display prices.