Seven steps to Euro success
A company euro checklist
- Have a senior manager assume responsibility for the project.
Form a working group from each functional area (Sales, Accounts, etc)
- Start the working group members collecting information from:
- Parent companies, subsidiaries, partners, customers, suppliers, bank(s)
- Official publications from Euro information Centres and Forfás
- Trade/Industry association Codes of Practice and case studies
- Media sources, web sites and mail lists, conferences, seminars, user groups
- Professional advisors: accountants, auditors, legal consultants
- Software suppliers and training providers
- Review findings to analyse scope and impact on your business.
- Use Forfás checklists and planning tools for more help
- Think through (visualise) transition scenarios
- Look along the supply chain for second-order ("ripple") effects - e.g. in
distributors
- Plan how to assist customers
- Are some customers dominant and how does that affect your changeover?
- List for both home and export markets the products, threats, and opportunities
- Consider sales, contracts, customer service, PR, advertising, corporate image
- What are equipment, cash handling, and security implications of cash changeover?
- What is the effect of price transparency on buying and selling, pricing policy?
- Will you change packaging, translation, document design, promotional literature?
- What changes will you have to make to price lists and price points?
- Do you need dual display of prices and when will the euro be dominant?
- Do you know what your competitors are doing about the euro?
- Plan how to deal with suppliers
- Are any suppliers dominant in the market?
- Do suppliers set prices for you (e.g. RRP)?
- Will the eurozone offer you potential new suppliers of materials and services?
- Identify functional / operational implications of change
Accounts
- Speak to your accountants and note what needs to be done by whom and when.
- Consider PAYE, PRSI, VAT returns and filing annual accounts
Bank
- Talk to your bank to learn what euro services are they offering and at what charges
- Will you be opening a separate euro account?
- When will you change your Púnt account to euro?
Information Technology
- Hardware inventory (computers, cash registers, scanners, and credit card terminals)
- Software inventory (accounts, order processing, stock control, payroll, specialised)
- What warranty and evidence do vendors provide of how their software handles both púnt
and euro in databases, transactions and accounts?
- Set up the project organisation with tasks and work plans for the changeover
- Track the work closely by schedule, lead-times, priorities, conversion dates
- Provide a budget; this could be 1-2% of turnover.
- Develop a contingency plan for risks
- Employees may need training for new functionality
- Manual currency conversions are notorious for causing clerical errors.
- Design, rehearse, test, and implement changes and take corrective action as required
- Communicate progress, achievements, and benefits to all!
Patrick O'Beirne is a software quality consultant with a special interest in the Year
2000 and euro currency changeover. His book "Managing the Euro in Information
Systems: Strategies for Successful Changeover" was published by Addison Wesley in
August 1999, ISBN: 0-201-60482-5. The accompanying CD has software,fonts, web links,
europapers and articles. The table of contents can be seen on the web at http://www.sysmod.com/maneuris.htm
He may be contacted at Systems Modelling Ltd in Ireland at the web site http://www.sysmod.com
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