"Dead dodgy": Outraged shopper uncovers sneaky Coles practice
One disgruntled shopper has called out Coles for their "deceptive" tactic to mislead customers about their special deal prices.
After finding that prices online were often mismatched to prices in store, regular Coles shopper Rowan Element got into the habit of checking if the price of an item was the same on the specials tag and its original tag, with the initial price often exaggerated on the specials tag to make the promotion appear more appealing.
On Thursday, Element discovered one Coles store in Canberra employing this sneaky practice with the original tag conveniently hidden behind the promotion.
"I bought this humble pack of sliced mushrooms, they were on special 'two for $6.50' or $4 for one. When I moved the specials tag the price was $3.50... It is not the first time that I’ve noticed something like this," she told Yahoo News Australia.
"Clearly Coles put the price up to make the 'special' look better but forgot to take off the original price ticket."
After taking the mushrooms to the checkout and being charged $4 for the one pack, Element asked to speak to a manager and called out the "deceptive advertising".
Staff provided a refund for the mushrooms and allowed the shopper to keep the produce before "literally running" to remove the offending tag from the shelf.
Despite the small price discrepancy, the shopper believes the issue lies with the dishonestly of the supermarket giant, rather than with the small 50 cent disparity.
"Sadly I think it's what we've come to expect from large corporations determined to make massive profits at the expense of their customers. There's total disregard for morality of their behaviour... It's dead dodgy" she said.
Coles confirmed to Yahoo News the price tag in question at the Canberra store has been "corrected", however, it did not respond to questions regarding accusations that the supermarket was doing it on purpose.
"Coles takes clear and accurate pricing information on tickets very seriously," a spokesperson said. "We always aim to ensure that our specials represent value for our customers and have confirmed that the special tickets were indeed correct in these instances."
Image credits: Yahoo News / Shutterstock