--- title: Consumer Watchdog Says Amazon's List Prices Are Bogus description: A nonprofit group claims Amazon is violating the law by posting misleading list prices. authors: - name: Jennifer Calfas url: https://money.com/author/jennifer-calfas/ at_money_since: 2017 articles: 339 covers: - Business - Banking - Career Advice - Credit Cards - Economy and Politics - Education - Housing - Identity Theft - Insurance - Investing - Lifestyle - Loans - Personal Finance - Pets - Retirement - Shopping - Taxes - Technology social: - https://x.com/jencalfas former_staff: true published: '2017-03-21T14:56:26.000Z' modified: '2024-04-17T05:29:13.000Z' section: Business tags: - Amazon - Consumer Watchdog - list prices - onetime - Retail word_count: 418 canonical: https://money.com/consumer-watchdog-amazon-list-prices-bogus/ type: Article source: structured-blocks --- > **Disclosure:** We research all brands listed and may earn a fee from our partners. Research and financial considerations may influence how brands are displayed. Not all brands are included. [Learn more](https://money.com/page/disclaimer/). ![Company Signs](https://img.money.com/2017/03/amazon.jpg) *Amazon corporate office building in Sunnyvale, California.* The [California](http://www.thedrive.com/news/8337/trump-wont-overturn-californias-emissions-jurisdiction-in-epa-fuel-economy-review)\-based [Consumer Watchdog](https://money.com/donald-trump-cfpb-richard-cordray-randy-neugebauer/) group claims [Amazon](https://money.com/amazon-online-shopping-millennials/) is misleading its customers by posting inflated list prices to give the impression the company is offering more of a discount. The nonprofit public-interest group [filed a petition](http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/resources/ltrbecerr032017.pdf) to Calif. Attorney General Xavier Becerra on Monday, claiming Amazon is violating state and federal law because, Consumer Watchdog said based on [its own study](http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/resources/atp_pricing_2.0.pdf) in February, many products Amazon’s website feature list prices that are greater than the existing market price. “The reference prices were an entirely bogus notional price that created the false impression that customers were getting a deal when they were not,” the petition, written by John Simpson, Privacy Project director for Consumer Watchdog, reads. List prices — or reference prices — are posted on some products sold on Amazon to show the difference between a competitor's price and Amazon’s. Consumer Watchdog [reviewed](http://www.consumerwatchdog.org/resources/atp_pricing_2.0.pdf) more than 4,000 products sold by the retail giant and found that references prices were included on more than a quarter of Amazon’s stock. The study found around 40% of the list prices used were larger than the highest price charged by any competitor for the same item. The Federal Trade Commission standards warn against inflating list prices, as the Consumer Watchdog notes in its petition. "If the list price is significantly in excess of the highest price at which substantial sales in the trade area are made, there is a clear and serious danger of the consumer being misled by an advertised reduction from this price," [the FTC says.](http://www.lawpublish.com/ftc-decprice.html) The Consumer Watchdog study was conducted from Feb. 3 through Feb. 6. “This reference price creates the impression that the consumer is getting a deal because the price paid is substantially lower the one with the line through it,” Simpson wrote in the petition. “The catch is the product is actually widely available from many other outlets at prices much lower than the crossed-out reference price on the Amazon website.” Amazon said the report from Consumer Watchdog was "misleading" in a statement. “Manufacturers, vendors and sellers provide list prices, but our customers care about how the price they are paying compares to other retailers. We validate list prices against actual prices recently found across Amazon and other retailers, and we eliminate List Price when we believe it isn’t relevant to our customers,” the company said in a statement. "Using recent price history of the product on Amazon we’ve also introduced a ‘Was' price to provide customers with an alternative reference price when we don’t display List Price.” ```json { "@context": "https://schema.org", "@graph": [ { "@type": "BreadcrumbList", "@id": "https://money.com/consumer-watchdog-amazon-list-prices-bogus/#breadcrumb", "itemListElement": [ { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 1, "name": "Home", "item": "https://money.com" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 2, "name": "Business", "item": "https://money.com/business/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 3, "name": "E-Commerce", "item": "https://money.com/e-commerce/" }, { "@type": "ListItem", "position": 4, "name": "Consumer Watchdog Says Amazon's List Prices Are Bogus" } ] }, { "@type": "WebSite", "@id": "https://money.com/#website", "url": "https://money.com", "name": "Money", "publisher": { "@id": "https://money.com/#organization" } }, { "@type": "WebPage", "@id": "https://money.com/consumer-watchdog-amazon-list-prices-bogus/#webpage", "url": "https://money.com/consumer-watchdog-amazon-list-prices-bogus/", "name": "Consumer Watchdog Says Amazon's List Prices Are Bogus", "isPartOf": { "@id": "https://money.com/#website" }, "datePublished": "2017-03-21T14:56:26.000Z", "mainEntity": { "@id": "https://money.com/consumer-watchdog-amazon-list-prices-bogus/" }, "inLanguage": "en-US", "breadcrumb": { "@id": "https://money.com/consumer-watchdog-amazon-list-prices-bogus/#breadcrumb" }, "dateModified": "2024-04-17T05:29:13.000Z" }, { "@type": "Article", "headline": "Consumer Watchdog Says Amazon's List Prices Are Bogus", "articleSection": "Business", "image": [ { "@type": "ImageObject", "url": "https://img.money.com/2017/03/amazon.jpg", "width": 5472, "height": 3648 } ], "author": [ { "@type": "Person", "name": "Jennifer Calfas", "url": "https://money.com/author/jennifer-calfas/", "@id": "https://money.com/author/jennifer-calfas/#author", "sameAs": [ "https://x.com/jencalfas" ] } ], "publisher": "https://money.com/#organization", "datePublished": "2017-03-21T14:56:26.000Z", "description": "A nonprofit group claims Amazon is violating the law by posting misleading list prices.", "abstract": "A nonprofit group claims Amazon is violating the law by posting misleading list prices.", "@id": "https://money.com/consumer-watchdog-amazon-list-prices-bogus/", "inLanguage": "en-US", "dateModified": "2024-04-17T05:29:13.000Z", "wordCount": 418, "keywords": [ "Amazon", "Consumer Watchdog", "list prices", "onetime", "Retail" ], "about": [ { "@type": "Thing", "name": "Business", "sameAs": [ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business" ] }, { "@type": "Thing", "name": "E-commerce", "sameAs": [ "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-commerce" ] } ] } ] } ```