According to Pierre van Heerden, Commissioner for Food, the Commission still hears too many examples of misleading or incorrect pricing.
He called on major supermarkets to improve and publicise their refund policies, saying this would provide an incentive to improve the accuracy of their prices.
Customers must be able to trust that the advertised price is the price they pay, he said.
“Kiwi consumers expect and deserve better. The ongoing level of pricing errors across the major supermarkets is simply unacceptable and I do not believe the major supermarkets are doing enough to fix these issues and get it right in the future.”
Van Heerden said the responsibility for resolving the issues lay entirely with senior management at both Foodstuffs and Woolworths NZ.
The committee had requested a commitment from the top executives of the three largest supermarkets: Woolworths, Pak 'n Save and New World.
“The grocery industry is worth $25 billion a year. Even if errors were a tiny percentage of that, the total amount New Zealanders would pay at the checkout would be tens of millions of dollars a year. That is unacceptable.”
He also said supermarkets' procedures for recording customer complaints were inadequate and that the lack of clarity and reporting meant supermarkets were unable to identify potential compliance issues.
“Complaints data is a useful source of information that can help you identify trends and issues so you can address them.”
According to Van Heerden, customers played a key role in drawing attention to pricing issues, but the refund policy at the three largest supermarkets was either missing, not clearly advertised or did not offer the benefits it offered.
The committee had formulated the following expectations of the large supermarkets:
Review and amend your refund policy to demonstrate your commitment to pricing integrity, for example by offering a full refund for mispriced goods
Promote refund policy prominently
Ensure that there are comprehensive policies and processes in place around price complaints and fully train staff in these matters.
According to Van Heerden, the expectations were separate from the ongoing investigations being conducted under the Fair Trading Act.
Although the three largest supermarkets responded positively to the commission's expectations, Van Heerden said she “will wait and see whether they translate their words into action”.