Dong devaluation pushes prices up

The devaluation of the Vietnamese dong has already pushed the cost of a number of products up.

Tour operators announced an increase in prices for outbound tours just a few days after the State Bank of Viet Nam (SBV) announced it was devaluing the dong by 9.3% against the US dollar last Friday.

The increase had been from between 5 and 7% since Monday, a representative from Ben Thanh Tourist said.

Head of the company’s Outbound Department Ta Thi Cam Vinh said that customers who had booked tours before the announcement by the SBV would not be affected. In those cases, her company would accept the loss.

The new exchange rate had forced companies to change their tour prices, she added.

The Lua Viet Travel Company shared that it was also facing difficulties buying dollars from banks.

The exchange rate on the black market was so much higher that the company had to increase its outbound tour prices by 10%.

Meanwhile, Saigontourist said it was trying to maintain prices until April, but the exchange rate adjustment was still impacting on the cost of tours, as the prices were in dollars.

While many companies have increased prices, others are accepting losses or a cut in profits.

A representative from Fiditour said his company did not have any plans to increase prices. The company sold tours in Vietnamese dong and would continue to apply the old exchange rate.

The company had to accept losses to keep customers, he added.

Vietravel and TST Tourist also committed to maintaining existing prices. They also sell their tours in Vietnamese dong.

Like tour operators, car importers and assembly companies announced their would be a price increase.

Last Friday, Hyundai Thanh Cong (official importer of Hyundai Company in Viet Nam) sent a memo to resellers instructing them to increase prices by up to VND78 million per vehicle.

Other companies such as Toyota, Honda, Truong Hai and Mercedes said they were considering how they would respond to the move.

They said that higher prices were unavoidable because they had pay for imported cars and spare parts in dollars.

The cost of electrical goods is also likely to increase.

Dinh Anh Huan, Director of thegioidientu.com said his company had been forced to increase the cost of products such as Samsung and Sharp by 5-10% from Monday.

Huan also said that most electrical shops and centres were still selling previously-imported products so that they had not had to increase prices yet.

The new prices would only be applied when shops imported new products to serve the demand on National Liberation and Labour Days which fall at the end of April. – VNS

Tags: Vietnam dong devaluation