1-Day Online Retailer Fined $840,000 for Misleading Consumers

I knew it, I bloody well knew it. I even mentioned as much on this deal https://www.cheapies.nz/node/27358 back in May last year and had people flat out telling me I was wrong.


From Stuff https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/300681806/the-warehouse-gro…

Online retailer 1-Day, owned by The Warehouse Group has been fined $840,000 for promotional claims, which were likely to mislead shoppers about how long its daily deals would run for and the quantity of stock available.

Commerce Commission fair trading general manager Vanessa Horne said 1-Day, which now trades under TheMarket, promoted its daily deals “for today only”, despite often rolling them over consecutive days.

The online store had also been programmed to progressively reduce the quantity of stock displayed as available throughout the day, meaning consumers were often not seeing accurate information about the stock available or how long the offer would be available, Horne said.

By representing that the sales offer period and amount of stock was limited, consumers were encouraged to make quick purchasing decisions and may have been deterred from taking their time to make decisions about buying products, or from shopping around before buying, she said.

The promotion of daily deals and use of a countdown timer between 2016 and 2020 gave the impression that goods were available at an indicated price for a limited time, and a stock level indicator gave the impression that stock was running out.

“In fact, often neither of these things were true and on many occasions the goods were available at the same price the next day,” Horne said.


Crafty buggers aye! I always thought that wording was terribly misleading, especially when you'd see it beside the same products that were at the same price week after week!

I wonder how much business they've lost or gained since moving to the Market? I know I used to visit their old site nearly every day but now I only look at them when there's a deal posted on here.

Related Stores

1-day.co.nz
1-day.co.nz

Comments

  • so who pockets the money? does it get paid back to customers?

    • If the customers are taxpayers, which they are, since they will be paying GST, then I guess so… kinda :-)

  • Wait what?! The Warehouse Group misleading the public?! Shocking!

    • No, this was before the warehouse took ownership.
      Its in the article

  • +1

    "programmed to progressively reduce the quantity of stock displayed as available throughout the day" - that's sneaky…haha

    • It's amazing they found that out. Either someone on the staff blew the whistle or the CC staff were able to seize and inspect their servers or whatever.

      • The CC probably just asked something like, 'So, tell me how this all works.'

        Very few employees are going to be less than honest when asked by a legitimate investigator.

  • Ha! Even those little pop-ups that says "so and so from abc bought product xyz for $888" can be fake! Haha

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/129895209/warning-for-occas…

    The Commerce Commission has issued a formal warning to online gift box retailer Occasion Box for making false and unsubstantiated claims on its website that were likely to mislead online shoppers.

    Between May and December last year, Occasion Box used “sales pops” purchased from a third-party e-commerce provider, which generated pop-up notifications of fake purchases by fictional consumers supposedly from various locations around Aotearoa New Zealand.

    The notifications included links to products sold on the website and wording to say that it was a “verified purchase”.

    This would give the impression to shoppers that others were snapping up products.

    …………

    https://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/early-edition/audio/vane…

    ………….

    The Commerce Commission has issued a formal warning to online retailer, Occasion Box, for making false and unsubstantiated claims on its website last year.

    It comes after The Warehouse Group's 1-Day, has been fined $840,000 for misleading how long its daily deals would run for, and the quantity available.

    ………

  • This reminded me once I tried to get The Warehouse to price beat 1-day, the live agent said 1-day is a daily deal website, so they would not honour the pricebeat, well even the warehouse live agent think so, I guess ComCom aren't wrong 😂

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