Dollar General penalized $1.8 million for overcharging shoppers
That “sale” at Dollar General may not have been such a bargain after all. An investigation by the New York Attorney General’s Office found that shoppers were routinely charged more at checkout than the prices advertised on shelves, signs, coupons and weekly ads.
Now Dollar General is paying for it, but not quite with a giant check. The company will provide $1.875 million worth of food and personal items to Foodlink, a Rochester-based nonprofit that helps fight hunger across New York. Read on for more.
The price on the shelf was not always the price at checkout
The investigation started after consumers complained that Dollar General was charging more than advertised. New York law requires retailers to charge customers the lowest advertised, posted or marked price for an item. Stores are also expected to maintain at least 98% price accuracy during inspections by Weights and Measures officials.
Dollar General was not consistently hitting that mark. The Attorney General's Office reviewed more than 900 inspection reports from Dollar General stores across New York between 2021 and 2023. About 43% of those reports recorded price-accuracy failures above the state's 2% tolerance.
Then investigators went shopping themselves. During a secret-shopper operation at 11 Dollar General stores in Western New York, investigators found they were overcharged on roughly 14% of the items they bought. They also found mismatches between shelf tags, digital and print advertisements, digital coupons and the prices that actually appeared at checkout.
Even the receipts weren't making things easier
The investigation uncovered another problem: Dollar General receipts were surprisingly difficult to decode. Some receipts showed only an item's original price. Others showed only the final price after promotions and discounts. Some reportedly showed neither clearly.
That meant shoppers sometimes had to do the math themselves to figure out what they actually paid for a particular product.
Dollar General now has a lot more homework
Under the settlement, Dollar General must make several changes across its New York stores. The company will have to honor the lowest listed price whenever shelf, advertised and register prices don't match and create a process to verify that weekly ad prices match store and register prices. The store also needs to redesign receipts so discounts and savings are clearly shown for each item, post signs reminding shoppers that Dollar General must honor the lowest price, train all New York employees on price accuracy and assign employees to keep shelf tags accurate.
In addition to the above, the settlement requires Dollar General to have an independent auditor conduct surprise pricing audits at every New York store twice per fiscal year, conduct 15 additional random audits each fiscal year comparing advertised, shelf and register prices, and have district managers conduct pricing audits every six weeks. Every pricing problem identified by inspections or audits needs to be fixed within 24 hours.
The $1.875 million is going somewhere useful
Rather than sending the penalty straight into New York's general coffers, Dollar General will provide $1.875 million in food and personal goods to Foodlink. The Rochester nonprofit says it will work with its network of food pantries and meal programs to distribute the products to people facing food insecurity.
For shoppers, though, the change they feel is supposed to happen at the register. If the shelf says one price and the scanner says another, the lower price is supposed to win.
Source: Yonkers Times
