BasketPrice

A “was” price is a claim, not a fact

The crossed-out price next to a discount is supplied by the seller and almost never audited. The only way to know whether a price is good is to compare it with what that same seller charged before.

Updated · BasketPrice editorial

What the rule actually says

US advertising rules are narrower than most shoppers assume. The FTC’s Guides Against Deceptive Pricing (16 CFR 233.1) allow a former-price comparison only where the higher price was the seller’s actual, bona fide price, openly offered for a reasonably substantial period of time — not a price invented to make a reduction look larger.

Nothing in that rule requires a retailer to show you the evidence, and nothing checks it before the badge appears. Enforcement is after the fact and rare. So the crossed-out number reaches you unverified.

The three claims worth separating

Manufacturer’s suggested price (MSRP) is a number the manufacturer publishes. It can be years old and may never have been charged by anyone. It is not evidence about this retailer.

A former price is what this retailer charged before. That is the only comparison that tells you something about today’s price — and it is the one you cannot see on a product page.

A competitor’s price is a fourth thing again. A discount measured against a rival’s number tells you about the rival, not about whether this is a good time to buy.

How to check one in about thirty seconds

Find the same item at the same retailer in a price history — ours or anyone’s. Look for the highest price actually recorded in the last 90 days. If the claimed “was” price sits above that line, nobody has observed the retailer charging it recently.

Then ignore the percentage entirely and look at the median. A price below its own 90-day median is cheap for that item at that shop, whatever the badge says; a price at the median is ordinary even when the badge says 40% off.

What we do with it

We record every price we see, per retailer, and we never adopt a retailer’s comparison price as our own. When a claimed former price sits above everything we have observed, we say so on the card in plain words instead of printing the discount.

We also refuse to make a claim at all until we have at least ten observations of that product at that retailer. Ten is not a magic number; it is the point below which "lowest we have seen" says more about how little we have watched than about the price.

Claims we cannot verify right now

Each of these offers advertises a former price higher than any price we have recorded for that exact item at that exact retailer in 90 days. That does not prove the claim is false — the price may predate our record — but it does mean the discount is unevidenced.

A lineTwo or more readings. Every turn in it is a price we saw, with a date on it.A dashed lineOne reading so far. We are not guessing what came before it.3/10 checksHow much record stands behind the price. We hold a verdict until 10.

Questions people ask

Is an inflated list price illegal?
A former-price comparison is deceptive under the FTC’s pricing guides (16 CFR 233.1) if the higher price was not an actual price offered openly for a reasonably substantial period. MSRP comparisons are treated separately and are legal even when no retailer charges MSRP, which is why they are common.
Why does the same product show a different discount at each shop?
Because each retailer chooses its own comparison price. The percentage measures the gap between two numbers the same company picked, so it is not comparable across shops. The paid price is.