Athens, Thessaloniki city centres among seven areas where shops will open on Sunday

21:57 7/7/2014 - Πηγή: E-Typos

The city centres of Greece's two largest cities, Athens and Thessaloniki, will be among the seven areas of Greece where shops will be allowed to open on Sundays on a pilot basis, according to a development ministry decision signed on Monday. The other areas where the measures will apply include some of the country's top tourist destinations - such as the islands of Rhodes, Mykonos,

Santorini, Kos and Syros or the peninsula of Halkidiki in northern Greece - and the Pikermi and Rafina districts in Attica.
The measure, which is due to be published in the government gazette, is among the prior actions demanded of Greece under the memorandum agreements for the bailout loans, which stipulate that the ministerial decision must be issued by July 7, 2014 and state the areas where shops have the option to stay open every day of the week, regardless of size and without the approval of the regional authority in the area.
Its implementation will be among the actions to be monitored by the next troika review and, judging by the results of the pilot implementation of the measure in the above areas, the issue of Sunday opening for all shops in the spring of 2015 will be re-examined, without ruling out full deregulation of shop opening hours throughout the country.
Apart from Sunday opening, deregulation will have an impact in terms of sales periods and special offers, with the development ministry due to issue a ministerial decision by October 7 establishing a code of conduct for protecting consumers with respect to special offers, sales and other promotional activity. The existing regime will be re-examined at the end of the current year so that legislation lifting all remaining restrictions will be passed by early 2015.