‘Bol and Amazon use misleading discounts’

The Dutch Consumer Association has sent a cease-and-desist letter to Amazon and Duch online marketplace Bol. The association demands that the platforms immediately stop offering misleading discounts. These fake deals violate legal regulations.

This was announced in a press release by the Dutch Consumer Association (Consumentenbond) last week. For two months, the organization kept track of the prices of popular products, that get discounts related to the FIFA World Cup. Of the 1,142 products that were tracked, 323 got discounts at least once. This means that the online marketplaces displayed a crossed-out price and a discount percentage. Both platforms have responded and said that they do not agree with the claims of the association.

108 misleading deals

According to regulations, these percentages and crossed-out prices need to be based on the lowest selling price of the past 30 days. On Amazon, 46 of all 113 deals were misleading. And on Bol, 62 out of 210 promotions were misleading. At both platforms, prices were actually lower before the deal, and lower than what was advertised. This means that they were not actually discounted at all.

Fake ‘sales’ examples on both platforms

For example, a Bluetooth speaker was ‘on sale’ on Amazon, for 147 euros. This was supposedly a 26 percent discount off the ‘regular price’ of 199.99 euros. However, before the deal, the price had been 133 euros for nearly a month.

On Amazon, the discounted price was actually higher than the regular price

And on Bol, a television was on sale for 349 euros, with a 12 percent discount off the crossed-out ‘usual’ price of 399 euros. But in the 60 days leading up to this deal, the product had never cost 399 euros. It was actually 349 euros for almost the whole period, except on July 6^th when it cost 329 euros. This means that this was actually the lowest price within the statutory 30-day period.

Other marketplaces have made changes

“We have been investigating fake discounts for years and have called out retailers when they do not follow the rules. This has already led to changes at Coolblue and Wehkamp, so a change is possible. But Amazon and Bol continue to lure customers with these offers, even though these platforms know the rules”, said Sandra Molenaar, director of the Consumer Association.

‘If they fail to comply with pricing regulations, we will take legal action’

“As far as we are concerned, enough is enough. We demand that Amazon and Bol comply with pricing regulations and provide an accurate representation of the savings in their offers. If they fail to do so, we will take legal action.”

‘We will be strictly monitoring for fake deals’

According to the regulations, consumers need to be able to trust pricing information on all (online) stores. Because of that, a discount should be an actual discount. The Consumer Association has now focused their research on Bol and Amazon, because these are the two largest online platforms in the Netherlands.

“But we continuously monitor prices and have a warning for other sellers: in the run-up to Black Friday, we will once again be strictly monitoring for fake deals and taking action against violators. In the meantime, we urge consumers to report any suspicious offers to us”, said Molenaar.