Retailers will be familiar that a number of UK-based publishers place a €RSP on the cover of their title alongside the £STG RSP.
Ordinarily, this € price is advised to the wholesaler and therefore the EM Delivery Note will list the €RSP as the price upon which the wholesale price is based.
Difficulties for retailers can arise when the publisher prints a €RSP upon the title without having advised the wholesaler (in this instance, EM News), or when such advice is given but not actioned. In such instances, the £STG RSP issued to “reckon” the Euro €RSP using the EM Ready Reckoner with a delivery note RSP that is significantly higher than the € price on the cover of the title.
The most recent issue of Cycling World had cover price of STG £4.75 and Euro €4.99.
EM News delivered these titles with a Euro €7.75. This RSP would be the correct €RSP for a STG £4.75 product retailing with 9% VAT based on the latest (Oct 2015) EM Ready Reckoner.
Any retailer selling the title at the recommended selling price printed on the cover as Euro €4.99 would actually lose 75 cent on each title.
RSP €7.75 ex VAT = €7.11 less 25% discount = €5.33
Selling €4.99 ex VAT = €4.58
Retailers or their staff that see a €RSP printed on the cover of the magazine can be forgiven in believing that this (coverprice) RSP is the correct retail price upon which the product would be sold and provide the store with a profit – they certainly don’t expect the product to cost them money.
We have asked EM for a full report on this practice.
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