The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is urging grocery retailers to display their prices in-store more accurately after a review found that 60% of pricing errors resulted in shoppers paying more at the checkout.
The CMA today (8 May) published compliance materials in a bid to help grocery retailers understand what they need to do to comply with consumer law, and is calling upon trade associations to share these materials.
The move follows a review into pricing errors found at UK stores, which were experienced by 4.2% of supermarkets, 14.4% of symbol convenience stores, 5.6% of variety stores and 7.8% of independent food stores.
The CMA performed on-site inspections looking at a range of products – including fresh fruit and vegetables and products on promotion – and has been reinforced by similar studies carried out by regional trading standards across the UK.
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Among the most common issues were missing prices, conflicting prices, prices not being displayed close enough to products, price tickets not legible, and multibuy promotion labels that didn’t state the cost of each item individually.
The regulatory body found that 60% of these errors resulted in a higher price being charged at the till, despite current legislation stating that specific the failure to provide clear and accurate pricing information is a breach of consumer law.
CMA interim executive director for consumer protection and markets George Lusty said: “We know how frustrating it can be when you get to the till only to find the price doesn’t match what was advertised.
“While lots of grocery retailers – particularly supermarkets – are complying with pricing rules, this needs to consistently be the case across all types of stores.
It’s important that shoppers can make well-informed choices based on accurate information, especially at a time when lots of people are looking to save money. That’s why we are reminding businesses of the importance of complying with consumer law.”
The calls for greater accuracy and transparency in pricing comes amid a government inquiry into fairness in the food supply chain, where both supermarkets and brands were grilled over shrinkflation and whether there should be more transparency on supermarket label tickets.
