Ireland gets a slightly higher price point than rest of Europe
by Nick Doerr 
{ Jan 18th 2007 at 10:00AM }
All right, we're going to roll out a couple of Europe-centric PS3 stories. The first of which is this: all of Europe will be paying approximately EUR 599 for their 60GB PS3. Ireland, however, will have to pony up an extra 30 Euros (EUR is Euros, I assume), bringing their total to 629. A Sony spokesperson explained: "Ireland is traditionally more expensive than other territories. The VAT rate there is 21 per cent, whereas it can be as low as 16 per cent in other EU countries." Okay, so that makes sense.Just curious, though... fellow Canadians, did you have to pay more for your PS3? Or was it an equivalent of the 600 US dollars? Not sure what we're trying to get at here, since a universal pricing system would never work unless we all adopted a single currency. This leads us to ponder: does this announcement really matter? Sure, it's extra in Ireland, but for (lack of a better term) good reason, right? Whatever. If you're from Ireland and this makes you hopping mad, drop a comment. Everyone else, leave your thoughts too.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Ian @ Jan 18th 2007 11:21AM
600 USD = approx. 700 CAD, but the price of a 60GB PS3 in Canada is only 659.99 CAD.
welshbloke @ Jan 18th 2007 10:39AM
Obviously when you talked about Europe you did not include old blighty (Great Britain or RIP off Britain as it is know locally) who will be picking up the PS3 for 647 Euros which you guessed is more than Ireland (and we have alower VAT rate 17.5)
saitam @ Jan 18th 2007 11:01AM
I payed around $660 canadian currency for the premium version not including tax, which by the way is around %14 where i live. So im not sure whether i did end up paying more or less
Raiders @ Jan 18th 2007 10:51AM
I don't really think this is fair. As a Scotsman i would pay the fair price Sony are too much disappointing people every year
L'univers de BL @ Jan 23rd 2007 4:19PM
The PS3 60GB is 659.99 CAN.
Kspraydad @ Jan 18th 2007 11:25AM
Hey Nick...
Canada does not have a VAT incorporated into the sales price...it is charged after the fact....
So...PS3 60GB is $659.99 CDN which is $561.71 USD
(Compared to our US friends that pay $599)
:)
Sales tax differs from province to province and will add from 6% to 14%
The NORMAL Canadian price for a PSP is $197 CDN (Walmart and RCSS) which is $167.72 or more than $30 cheaper than in the States....
cienislaw @ Jan 18th 2007 1:25PM
ireland isnt only country in eu, which has higher vat than 16%. im from poland and we have here 22% vat. but we are not using euros yet, so there wont be any official statement from sony about higher price here. my question is - how much this 1% vat difference from ireland will cost polish gammers?
Ste[hen @ Jan 18th 2007 2:36PM
"Not sure what we're trying to get at here, since a universal pricing system would never work unless we all adopted a single currency."
Obviously that wouldnt work either considering that most of Europe use the Euro and they still have a different price structure!
Anyways PS3 priced at £425 is alright I guess remembering that it includes a Blu-Ray player which costs £1000 on its own!
KilgoreTrout XL @ Jan 18th 2007 1:46PM
I think that the fact that the higher pricepoint is something wholly outside of Sony's control has been, to say the least, glossed over by several websites.
Some of them may or may not have posted a retraction or an update, but that's as useful as you believe retractions to be, I suppose. To me, the internet's mindset on the console wars these days is "where there's smoke there's fire."
naruto007 @ Jan 18th 2007 2:04PM
well that's still cheap compared with the prices that the ps3 gonna have here in my country in central america i havent see any ps3 here but the wii is 447 dollars god dam i just can imagine how much the ps3 will cost... 900 dollars? maybe, maybe more so dont fell bad latin america still owns with the totally blowing high prices lol
perhaps i live in Honduras and am looking forward to a shinny ps3 *.*
Sen @ Jan 18th 2007 2:15PM
I live in Ireland. And i'm picking up a PS3 at launch (i got a pre-order on one a week before it was delayed back in sept.)
Ireland can be a pretty dear country to live in. Surveys in this country show that we're one of the most expensive places to live in Europe. It's no real surprise that the price was going to be slightly higher. Most electronics always are. The wii was supposed to be €249, but it ended up being €269 here.
The problem with the price isn't sonys fault, it's Irelands. And even though i'll have to pay slightly more because of vat, i won't be bitching over losing €30. After all, I’ll have just spent €599 on top of that.
I’m just glad that the delay was only 4 months, and not 9-12 months.
I’ve been paying off bits of my deposit for a while now and all I’ll have to do is pick it up on the day and buy a few games.
March23rd can’t come fast enough
Seán
Kspraydad @ Jan 18th 2007 2:31PM
@ Sean (sorry....don't know how to do the accents!)
True true....
Wonder why Ireland's biggest export moved their head office outside of Ireland...TAX.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/08/08/nbono08.xml
Sen @ Jan 18th 2007 2:56PM
Vowel + Alt Gr
ÁÉÍÓÚ áéíúóú
It's fun when you know how! (Not really)
Meh! We don’t need Bono and his glasses. We’ll export rough accents and new swear words instead.
Seán
Frankie @ Jan 18th 2007 3:20PM
It doesnt really matter for Sony and I don't think this is THAT bad of a news. I mean, whats the market share of Ireland compared to the rest of Europe?
It is comparatively small even though the country is enjoying phenomenal economic growth.
Sen @ Jan 18th 2007 3:32PM
Ireland is a very Playstation-centric country. PS1 and PS2 were very well received here (Roughly one PS2 for every second home) That might only account for 2-3 million potential PS3 units (over a five year period), but it’s a 2-3 million unit market that they would like to keep.
Still it's not bad news and it won't put people off buying a PS3 at launch