ROME (Reuters) - Europe's new euro notes and coins face their first major road test on Wednesday as businesses reopen following the New Year holiday and people start using the brightly colored money in earnest. The largest financial switchover in history got off to a remarkably smooth start on January 1, with no major glitches reported in the 12 European Union states that have abandoned their national coinage and adopted the common currency. But most major shops and businesses were closed on ``e-day'' itself, meaning some 300 million Europeans, from the Arctic Circle to the fringes of Africa, only get their first real chance to try out the new money on Wednesday. A planned strike by bank and post office staff in France, and a one-day stoppage by workers at Italy's central bank might snarl the euro rollout in those two countries. Elsewhere, officials were confident that all would go according to plan. The appearance of the notes and coins on New Year's Day was the culmination of the EU's most ambitious project to date, giving Europeans tangible, everyday proof that they share more than just an accident of geography with their neighbors. Automated teller machines will provide only euros, and stores are expected to offer change in the new money, the death knell for such familiar currencies as Germany's Deutschemark, the French franc and Italian lira. Most of the 12 old national currencies -- from Ireland's punt, or pound, around since 1928, to Greece's drachma, with a history that goes back some 2,500 years -- will cease to exist by March.