Source: Radio New Zealand
RNZ / Nate McKinnon
The increasing use of digital price tags could allow supermarkets to use AI algorithms and ‘dynamic pricing’ where prices change in real time, a competition researcher says.
The government’s amendment to the Commerce Act, included increasing the Commerce Commission’s powers in combating predatory pricing , clarifying merger processes, and modernising the rules around new technologies, including AI.
University of Sydney researcher Lisa Asher says legislation should block the use of dynamic pricing in supermarkets.
She told Nine to Noon supermarkets in the United States were using data about customers to change pricing in online shopping.
Asher says legislation planned for New Zealand does not go far enough to stop the same happening here.
Woolworths New Zealand says it does use electronic shelf labelling in almost all stores, but it does not use dynamic or any personalisation in pricing.
“ESL is about more accurately displaying the prices we advertise. Instead of changing thousands of paper tickets every week across our 185 stores, we can update prices using ESL,” the company said in a statement. .
“We do not use dynamic pricing. We do not have any personalisation in our pricing.”
supermarket price errors supplied
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand