Less than two weeks from now, on 1 January 2002, the euro will
become legal tender across much of continental Europe. In what is
surely the most profound economic change to affect Europe in modern
times, many of our neighbours across the Channel will consign the
lira, the franc and the deutschmark to the great piggy bank in the
sky in favour of the single currency.
Here in the UK, the politicians continue to chew over whether or
not we should be part of this seismic change in the way Europe does
business.
But for corporate UK the question of whether we vote for or against
membership of the euro in a future referendum is of little
relevance. The euro is a reality - billions of coins and notes are
sitting in European banks and warehouses, awaiting roll-out in the
new year - and if your company has ambitions either to transact
with organisations and individuals on the continent or to sell to
Europeans in the UK, it needs reappraise its financial systems
accordingly.
Many large UK retailers and banks have already put systems in place
to deal with the euro. Marks & Spencer, HMV and John Lewis are
just three of the firms that will accept the euro from January.
The Daily Mail may brand this "euro-creep" but it is nothing more
than sound business sense.
European tourists and business travellers spend billions of pounds
in the UK each year. A Frenchman in a car in Dover, for instance,
is far more likely to buy his petrol from a forecourt that accepts
the euro than from one that does not. Companies owe it to their
shareholders to do all they can to ensure that they grab a slice of
this market.
Computer Weekly has been reminding the IT community of the imminent
arrival of the euro for years, but our euro wake-up call has gone
unheeded in many quarters. The big players - banks and major
retailers - may have done some spade work, but in smaller,
UK-centric companies there is still work to be done.
If you can count yourself among the ranks of the euro ditherers,
you need to ask yourself whether it is more cost-effective to
future-proof your business now against possible adoption of the
euro in the future, or to wait and see what the nation decides
before acting.
Once the country sets a course towards joining the single currency,
as it must inevitably do, we will see a boom time for consultancies
majoring in euro compliance. Moreover, the systems upon whose
implementation these consultancies will advise can only become more
expensive as demand increases.
Of course, some will argue that the more prudent organisations will
be those that wait for others to make the euro systems
implementation mistakes and learn from them. But by burying your
head in the sand you could be costing yourself a fortune in lost
business and rising costs.