"Within my competence I will personally monitor this issue and I will not allow that Lithuanian consumers were deceived," promised Bernatonis. The minister of justice will curb abuses by supplementing draft Law on the Adoption of the Euro and establishing liability for violations of this law. Yet liability will be established only for violation of showing prices in euros and litas. In other words, businessmen will be able to raise prices for other reasons, for example, costs of changing information and payment system.
Head of the State Consumer Rights Protection Authority Feliksas Petrauskas does not deny that it will be impossible to avoid increase in prices after the adoption of the euro. Yet he says that consumers would not feel it at once. "Of course, when talking to business associations, they explain that they will have to change computer programmes, so a person could see a difference of the price in euros and litas on the screen. Naturally, it will be included in the price. But we should take it normally, since that is the way it happens in the whole world. Prices are increasing," said Petrauskas.
