South Ayrshire Council’s Trading Standards Section is warning overseas travellers this week to be vigilant when buying their holiday money from Bureaux De Change. 

Following a recent investigation carried out within South Ayrshire, Trading Standards Officers were disappointed at the practices identified in some of the establishments visited.

The visits were carried out by Officers working in pairs. At three of the premises, the first officer, who didn’t ask the exchange rate, was given a lower rate than the officer who had entered 10 minutes later and who did.  This means that if a consumer didn’t ask then they were losing out on £1.12 for every £25 spent.

A spokesperson from Trading Standards said, “There are Regulations in place that cover Bureaux de Change but some of the problems we have encountered are not caught within them.  The practice of giving people better rates of exchange if they ask is not covered. However we feel that this is a practice that shouldn’t be employed by reputable traders.  If there was a statutory duty on all bureaux de changes to display their exchange rates for customers to view prior to purchase this would allow customers to shop around for the best deal.  At the moment it is up to the individual establishment to decide if they want to display their rates which can contribute to the practices highlighted.”

Councillor Hugh Hunter, Convener of South Ayrshire Council’s Community Safety Committee said, “I must admit to being surprised at these findings as I, along with most people, wouldn’t have thought that customers would need to actually ask the rate of exchange to get a fair deal for their holiday money.”
 
Trading Standards also warned consumers to be vigilant for traders who are claiming ‘Best Rate in town’ as this is not necessarily the case.  Councillor Hunter explained, “It became apparent during this project that consumers should definitely shop around to get the best rate as on one of the days checked the rate varied from 1.34 Euros to 1.40 Euros and that was between establishments that were only 3 minutes from each other.  On this same day one of the travel agents claiming ‘Best Rate in Ayr’ was not and was worse by 1.9 cents.”

The Trading Standards spokesperson continued, “We are currently speaking to the traders who breached the Regulations and will be notifying the head offices of the traders who are charging different rates to consumers. In addition we will also be passing our findings on to the Department of Trade and Industry recommending that steps are taken to tighten up the loopholes in this sector.”

June 2006