Paris waiters grumpy for a change

At last the British are giving French waiters a real reason to be miserable - they are paying the bill with their small change for fear of being left with local currency when the euro is introduced on 1 January.

Britons holidaying in Paris are clearing out all their francs and centimes from cupboard drawers, down the back of the sofa and from their trouser turn-ups, before they are finally taken out of circulation on 17 February.

Waiter Christophe Fournier, at the restaurant Les Philosophes in the Marais district, said: " You can't pay like that, it would take half an hour to count. I wouldn't even accept that as a tip. This is a restaurant not a bureau de change."

One of his customers, Gudmund Lokrantz, 20, an Anglo-Swedish Oxford undergraduate in Paris with girlfriend Ann, accepts that paying with coins won't make you popular.

"If I tried to pay for my bangers and mash with a pile of change at my local in Notting Hill they would get seriously annoyed. We are here clubbing and would think twice taking change out to nightclubs, especially as beers cost around a fiver."

Richard Legay, whose boulangerie is in the shadow of the Pompidou Centre, said: "We have had some English tourists digging for change in plastic money bags to pay for croissants. Normally you would expect that from down and outs but it makes a change. More often we have a problem of tourists trying to pay for a pain au chocolat with a credit card."

As francs and centimes are phased out the value of some is, ironically, set to rise. Already, recently minted coinage is fetching prices way above face value. The Eiffel Tower commemorative five-franc piece is now trading at £3. But the real goldmine for the numismatist is the two-franc coin of 1991, worth a cool £80.

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