The Croatian government has fined companies 234,000 euros for unjustly raising their prices after the introduction of the euro. Inspections will continue, Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic announced on Tuesday.
“It is not okay to keep raising prices while the government helps companies to function normally. It is not okay for the government to reduce VAT rates and that is not reflected in the final prices of products,” said Croatia’s economy minister Davor Filipovic. The visits by state inspectors are “the best educational measures” for those companies that have unfairly raised their prices.
Almost every third company affected
Previous checks had shown that about 30 percent of the stores had wrongly increased their prices. After the inspection visit, the prices there have been reset to the old level. The government had already asked companies about two weeks ago to reset their prices to the level of 31 December.
According to Filipović, the higher prices cannot be justified because, for example, producer prices have fallen and electricity and diesel prices are lower than in other countries. As reported, Croatia adopted the euro on January 1. In the first days of the new year, groceries, visits to cafes and hairdressers suddenly became more expensive. This is officially attributed to price rounding during the currency conversion.
The prime minister recalled on Tuesday that three aid packages worth 3.6 billion euros were put together last year to help households and businesses cope with the crisis. In addition to controls, subsidies for affected companies could be eliminated and additional taxes introduced. The government could also bring prices back to previous levels, it said.
Source: Krone
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