Comment by Tangurena2 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Tangurena2 | Hacker News Reader

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> Like, prices are displayed on the shelf for everyone to see. And they have to match what you pay at checkout.

Not all stores honor the prices posted on the shelves. Dollar General is one of the major offenders of this.

> Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey has filed suit against Dollar General, claiming deceptive and unfair pricing at its more than 600 retail stores throughout the state. The lawsuit alleges that Dollar General violated Missouri’s consumer protection laws by advertising one price at the shelf and charging a higher price at the register upon checkout.

> The joint investigation revealed that “92 of the 147 locations where investigations were conducted failed inspection. Price discrepancies ranged up to as much as $6.50 per item, with an average overcharge of $2.71 for the over 5,000 items price-checked by investigators.”

https://progressivegrocer.com/dollar-general-accused-decepti...

The bill involved is HB 895. Maryland's online statutes have not been updated (yet) to include the new sections.

https://mgaleg.maryland.gov/2026RS/bills/hb/hb0895E.pdf

The convention (among US state legislatures) is that existing language of statutes is in plain text, strikethrough is text to be removed and underlined is text to be added.

> Not all stores honor the prices posted on the shelves. Dollar General is one of the major offenders of this.

That's already illegal, as indicated by your link about the ongoing lawsuits.

Doesn't that depend on the state? I'm almost sure there are quite a few states that allow stores to charge a higher price at checkout than what the product is labeled with on the shelf.

That’s fraud, plain and simple. There are already laws against that. No more specific laws are needed.

Fraud: “a deliberate act of deception, misrepresentation, or concealment of material facts intended to gain an unauthorized benefit—typically money or property—while causing loss to another party.”

Isn't it common for state sales taxes to be added at the till? (I don't live in the US but that seemed to be what happened on my visits there)

Sales tax is a government imposed requirement that's not included in prices in the US, so there's no misrepresentation and no fraud. If that's what the commenter above was talking about, they're confused about what's being discussed.

Seems not contradictory to say that it legally has to match what you pay, when that is the content of the lawsuit against them, implying that their actions are illegal. Many states also already impose a stiff additional penalty for this practice (e.g. item must be sold heavily discounted or given free to any consumer that observes that the price charged at checkout differs from a price posted in the store)

But that's already illegal. And it's not dynamic pricing.

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