The Euro is Coming – Slovaks will have heavier wallets

The Euro is the common currency used by Belgium, Finland, France, Greece, the Netherlands, Ireland, Luxemburg, Germany, Portugal, Austria, Spain, Italy, Slovenia, Cyprus and Malta and these countries will be joined by Slovakia on 1st January 2009. This is the day when the Slovak Crown (Koruna) starts its valedictory journey.

The moment when the Slovak Crown becomes part of history is only a question of time, so it is essential that the intensity of the information campaign increases.

Wallets will be heavier

EU finance ministers agreed an exchange rate of 30.1260 Slovak Crowns to the Euro on July 8th 2008. This exchange rate will be used to convert all prices, incomes or expenses. People will have to become used to smaller sums than before. In order to give people enough time to acclimatise to the new prices, the prices in shops, the amount in your pay packet and invoice totals will be in both Crowns and Euros from August 8th 2008. Displaying the prices in both currencies should help people learn how to think in the new currency. Dual pricing will be obligatory all year after the introduction of the Euro until the end of 2009.

People will have to get used to “minutiae” – their wallets will get heavier. After the Euro is introduced, three more coins will be put into circulation which means that people will have more to carry. However, all coins will be of higher value than previously. Next year, if we get change in a shop of one hundred crowns, we won’t be given a bank note but perhaps five coins. We have to realise that Euro coins are not just small change, they have a real, significant value.

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What will our Euro look like?

All countries of the Eurozone use identical designs on both sides of each denomination of banknote. Windows and gateways from different historical periods dominate the front side of each banknote and symbolise “windows to the future”. The coins have a common reverse side but different obverse sides which are freely designed by each country. Slovakia decided on its designs three years ago by public vote and the following won: One and two Euro coins will show the Slovak double cross on the top of three peaks in a circle of 12 stars; 50, 20 and 10 Euro cents will show Bratislava Castle and 1, 2, and 5 Euro cents will show the peak of Krivan, a mountain in the Vysoke Tatry mountains.

The coins will be issued from the mint in Kremnica (Slovakia). About 500 million coins of all denominations will have to be issued by the middle of December 2008.

By Alžbeta Vargová
Photo: iStockPhoto, NBS

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