Major box office systems across Europe are now issuing tickets carrying prices in both Euros and the previous currency.
Tickets.com, whose latest Pass and Databox systems are already configured to deal with transactions in multiple currencies, arranged for their historical transaction data to be converted to Euros as the base currency at the stroke of midnight at new year. According to Tickets.com, the main confusion for box offices has arisen not from the transaction processing, but from the requirement to issue new notes and coins as change to counter customers.
Few UK venues have as yet had experience of the Euro, though NEWS Nottingham Playhouse, the only UK-based member of the European Theatre Convention, has announced that it is set up and ready to welcome Euro transactions. UK-based Tickets.com venues using the latest versions of PASS and Databox can already accept Euros, and upgrades are free to the Euro compliant version. This also applies to users of Galathea?s Enta version 3. Synchro?s Venuemaster is in the process of being upgraded in preparation for the potential expansion of Euro transactions; and Artifax, due to launch an integrated ticketing and venue management system at the end of March, has also committed to responding to demand for Euro-based transactions as it arises.