The sad story of the “Displaypreis”

Price tag - ©iStockphoto.com/alexslQ: When is a price not a price?

A: When it’s a “Displaypreis”

What sounds like a bad joke actually happened to me at a local supermarket last week – the very simple case of when the price on the shelf does not match the price in the computer.

Of course, this being Germany there is a law to govern such things and it is called the Preisangabenverordnung and acts in a similar way to the Sale of Goods act in the UK.  As I understand it, you cannot display a price on the shelf and then ask for a higher one at the till.

And yet it happens and I am usually more than willing to point this out and insist on paying the price that was on display.

Over the years I have experienced various answers.  Most supermarkets will just check that I am right and charge me the lower price, although I remember taking one employee to a shelf to show that the price in the computer was off by several Deutschmarks, only for them to remove the sign in question and say “so, now it’s not anymore” and insist on the higher price.

I have also been in supermarkets when the prices have been raised during the course of the day, so that the price on the shelf changed after I took something off it!

But the absolute winner in excuses was the one last week.  The Displaypreis. [Read more…]

Bio-ethanol price rise

I guess it had to happen in the end.  After months of blogging about the price of oil and hence the price of petrol, now the price of bio-ethanol has gone up.

The following sign greeted me when I went to fill up this week:

bild032.jpg

So now the price is at 0,949EUR/Litre, but that’s still a lot cheaper than buying normal petrol!

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