{"id":95122,"date":"2024-09-23T08:03:11","date_gmt":"2024-09-23T08:03:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/index.php\/2024\/09\/23\/australia-supermarkets-sued-over-fake-discount-claims\/"},"modified":"2024-09-23T08:03:11","modified_gmt":"2024-09-23T08:03:11","slug":"australia-supermarkets-sued-over-fake-discount-claims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/australia-supermarkets-sued-over-fake-discount-claims\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia supermarkets sued over fake discount claims"},"content":{"rendered":"

Australia\u2019s consumer watchdog is suing the country\u2019s two biggest supermarket chains, alleging they falsely claimed to have permanently dropped the prices of hundreds of items.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) claims Coles and Woolworths broke consumer law by temporarily raising prices before lowering them to a value either the same as or higher than the original cost.<\/p>\n

Coles said it would defend itself against the allegations, while Woolworths said it would review the claims.<\/p>\n

The grocery giants, which account for two thirds of the Australian market, have come under increasing scrutiny in the past year over alleged price gouging and anti-competitive practices.<\/p>\n

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the alleged conduct, if proven to be true, is \u201ccompletely unacceptable\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not in the Australian spirit. Customers don\u2019t deserve to be treated as fools,\u201d he said at a press conference, at which he also revealed draft legislation for a previously promised \u201ccode of conduct\u201d for supermarkets.<\/p>\n

ACCC chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb said Coles and Woolworths have spent years marketing their \u2018Prices Dropped\u2019 and \u2018Down Down\u2019 promotions, which Australian shoppers now understand to represent a sustained reduction in the regular prices of products.
\nBut in many cases \u201cthe discounts were, in fact, illusory\u201d, she added.<\/p>\n

The watchdog\u2019s investigation \u2013 sparked by complaints and the ACCC\u2019s own monitoring \u2013 found Woolworths had misled customers about 266 products over 20 months, and Coles for 245 products across 15 months.<\/p>\n

The products included everything from pet food, Band-Aid plasters and mouthwash, to Australian favourites like Arnott\u2019s Tim Tam biscuits, Bega Cheese and Kellogg\u2019s cereal.<\/p>\n

The ACCC estimated that the two companies \u201csold tens of millions\u201d of the affected products and \u201cderived significant revenue from those sales\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany consumers rely on discounts to help their grocery budgets stretch further, particularly during this time of cost of living pressures,\u201d Ms Cass-Gottlieb said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is critical that Australian consumers are able to rely on the accuracy of pricing and discount claims.\u201d<\/p>\n

The ACCC is seeking that the Federal Court of Australia impose \u201csignificant\u201d penalties on the two firms, and an order forcing them to increase their charitable meal delivery programs.<\/p>\n

In a statement, Coles said the company\u2019s own costs were rising which led to an increase in product prices.<\/p>\n

It had \u201csought to strike an appropriate balance\u201d between managing that and \u201coffering value to customers\u201d by restarting promotions \u201cas soon as possible\u201d after new prices were set, it said.<\/p>\n

The company takes consumer law \u201cextremely seriously\u201d and \u201cplaces great emphasis on building trust with all stakeholders\u201d, it added.<\/p>\n

Woolworths said in a statement that it would engage with the ACCC over the claims.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur customers are telling us they want us to work even harder to deliver meaningful value to them and it\u2019s important they can trust the value they see when shopping our stores.\u201d<\/p>\n

Amid growing scrutiny of the supermarkets, the government commissioned a review of the country\u2019s existing Food and Grocery Code of Conduct.<\/p>\n

The review recommended a stronger, mandatory code of conduct be introduced and policed by the ACCC, so they can protect suppliers as well as consumers.<\/p>\n

The new code will set out standards for the companies\u2019 dealings with providers, who say they are being unfairly squeezed, and introduce massive fines for breaches.<\/p>\n

The post Australia supermarkets sued over fake discount claims<\/a> first appeared on KBC<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The post Australia supermarkets sued over fake discount claims<\/a> appeared first on KBC<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Australia\u2019s consumer watchdog is suing the country\u2019s two biggest supermarket chains, alleging they falsely claimed to have permanently dropped the prices of hundreds of items. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) claims Coles and Woolworths broke consumer law by temporarily raising prices before lowering them to a value either the same as or higher […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-95122","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=95122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95122\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=95122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=95122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chezaspin.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=95122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}