It’s going to be hilarious when these get hacked
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Reminder that by law, if the price is listed wrong:
Sometimes the price of an item in store or online at the checkout may not match the displayed or advertised price in store or online. If this happens, even by mistake, the business must either:
- sell the product for the lowest price - either the checkout price, or displayed or advertised price, or
- stop selling the item until the incorrect price is corrected.
What law? In what country?
Australia, the country the article is talking about. That was a quote from the ACCC website.
stop selling the item until the incorrect price is corrected
Not a lawyer but couldn't they just refuse to sell it to you? We all know it would be bullshit but couldn't a company say "Oh that minimum wage clerk made a mistake, but don't blame them, just an honest mistake."
Or is the law, if it's on the shelf, it must be honored?
They would have to refuse to sell to anyone. It would likely not be lawful to leave it on the shelf and sell it at the higher price to someone else who might not have noticed the discrepancy, until they fix up the shelf pricing.
I will institute my own "dynamic pricing" scheme if this ever happens
Is it really dynamic if the price is always "free"?
surely negative numbers are in the cards? since we deserve the compensation for all the trouble
Its much easier than you'd think.
~~Dynamic pricing~~ Price gouging. FTFY.
If my local store switches to digital price tags to do this I'm just going to gather as many as I can and flush them down the toilet.
It's a nice thought but good luck not getting caught on the 3k cameras in the store and following you to your car.
It would be a shame if your phone was infected by a malware that rewrites all the prices in the tags in your vicinity.
My local Woolies has had e-ink tags for at least two years, maybe more. Between this and Coles hiring Palantir, we mostly shop at Aldi. Bunnings and Kmart using facial recognition as if it's no biggie as well. How long until they partner with CBA to check your credit card limit as you stand in front of the bananas to see how much you'll pay?
They're opening an Aldi's near me. I'm excited.
Aldi's is the shit. No bloat, no bs, just groceries. They don't have some stuff, but for the staples you're set. I usually go to the more traditional grocery store every 4th trip or so.
Let’s call it what it is: price discrimination.
Dynamic sounds way more fun!
I’m still not clear on exactly what triggers this. Is it phone location, because a phone number is linked to all your data (unless you’ve been gaming it for the last 5-10yrs)? Do I walk by with my phone and the price goes up?
Is it like goodwill? Does the price change as you’re checking out? Do I grab a 2lb bag of medium roast coffee beans for $13, and because buying it consistently for decades, it’s now $18 at checkout? But is still $13 for the guy behind me who decided to try whole bean over pre-ground?
If rich people turn off their phones before hitting the parking lot and poor people leave theirs on, does the entire store get cheaper?
If you take a pic with your phone of the “advertised” price does that mitigate sudden increases while checking out, if you’re even watching?
Does having your unemployed, deadbeat uncle or kid do the shopping from their phone make it cheaper for the household?
What are the triggers?
We've had them for quite some time. They don't change price for individual customers, I don't think they change the price in the middle of the day either. But, I guess, they can change the prices just before opening, like if the wether service forecasts a rainy day they could rise the price of umbrellas and raincoats. Cold? Hot chocolate and soups. Hot? Ice cream and cold drinks. Certain asshole died overnight? Champaign and confetti cannons through the roof. And so on...
Oh, you mean price gouging
Oh, no no no. It's called "capitalism". Supply and demand pricing at it's finest! /s
In other news, shoplifting is inexplicably on the rise in shops featuring dynamic pricing.....
Boycott the stores that use them, it might help them change their mind behind they become the norm.
Should be against the law to change the price after the shop opens at something like a grocery store. Nobody should be able to shop anywhere where the price you pick it up at can change by the time you get to the checkout.
Edit: Maybe there could be some exception for mid day price changes if you emptied the entire store of customers first, but enforcing something like that seems difficult.
Then I won't be going to that supermarket.
Time to vote with our wallets. I absolutely will refuse to shop at any store in my area that starts implementing this.
Sure... If you even notice it. And if enough people will care and if there are still stores around that don't do that, clearly superior profit maximising scheme.
I'd rather want this stuff to become illegal. So calling your representatives, make news and go to the streets about this would I think help more that yet another boycott.
I'm going to start dynamic payments. "Oh, between 6-9pm I pay 10% less."
and then there will be a really popular AI driven phone app that you will use to scan items and find out if you're being ripped off or not
I already have a browser plugin that tells me the price history of everything at Coles. There's one for Woolies too.

These have got to be hackable in a fun way
Firmware on these is pretty tight. They're usually using CC2510s or CC2530s. The CC2510 has a voltage glitch hack that you can use to attempt to read the contents via the DCOUPL capcitor, but it's not very effective and you can only read a few bytes per attack.
You can see a github some tools some have created here. Eventually someone is going to read the firmware off theses and be able to hack them, it's just a matter of time.
Thanks. I hate it.
If they want to do dynamic pricing, maybe we'll just have to start dynamic shopping.
A problem area is pricing that changes 10 minutes after you put it in basket but before checkout. Though OP did go through some other abuse scenarios, though some were far fetched. This can't allow a store to personalize prices the way a web site can.
Portland banned it for housing. Time to ban it for everything else!
I've already sent feedback to Walmart about my refusal to buy anything with a digital price tag. The thing is, I believe them when they say that prices are only updated between 1:00 and 2:00 a.m. The problem is that that policy could change literally any time.
Walmart has every inch of their store covered in cameras. They have facial recognition systems so they know who I am the moment I walk in the store. They know I buy graham crackers. They know I've put up with price increases in the past. What is preventing them from adding $0.10 to those graham crackers' price tag the moment I walk down the crackers aisle? Literally nothing. They could, and that's reason enough for me to boycott
Free epaper displays!
Start pushing your state gov to ban this.
The chain grocery store near us (Safeway) has had stupidly high prices since the pandemic. I decided I’m not going to shop there anymore unless I really have to. We are lucky to have a locally-owned, small chain grocery store very close to us. Prices are high but honestly not much if at all higher than Safeway and I’d rather pay a small premium to help them stay in business. Also I doubt they would ever opt into something like this stupid price scheme, but Safeway absolutely would and will.
They already do that, just not as frequently. They change price tags of items every day by hand
Dynamic mass theft.
Innovative exploitation.
Next-Generation sculduggery.