cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/53855582
NEW YORK – The Federal Trade Commission has sued the bargain chain Dollar General for what it characterized as “long-running deceptive pricing practices” by charging customers more once they reach the register than the prices that are displayed on shelves and in advertisements.
Twenty states joined in the complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee. It said that Dollar General failed to correct the issue despite what it said was “extensive corporate knowledge of the problem.”
“Dollar General has betrayed the trust of millions of American consumers and imposed significant financial harm on communities and consumers who are already struggling to make their paychecks last,” wrote Christopher Mufarrige, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection.
Dollar General, based in Goodlettsville, Tennessee, just outside of Nashville, did not immediately return a request for comment from The Associated Press.
Every Dollar General store I’ve ever been in has been awful. They’re chronically under staffed by design. The stores are in constant disarray. Even the new ones. If you walk into a store 6 months after it was built you’d swear it was 50 years old based on how it looks.
I have two close ones and one is as you describe but the other is somehow nice. All the shelves have been “fronted” the food, even the produce, looks good. Prices are good too and some OTC medicine I take is cheaper and more reliably in stock than the grocery store.
They sell produce at these places? 😳
In many places they are the only option in an otherwise food desert.
A food desert with a Dollar General in it is still a food desert.
Dollar General threads are where it’s clear who’s from the city and who’s not.
What’s wrong hon? You’ve barely touched your Pringles
https://www.fna.usda.gov/snap/retailer/eligible
If they want to accept EBT cards, they need to be a SNAP vendor, which requires they stock some kind of produce. Gas station convenience stores in my area stock apples and bananas (among other things) to qualify.
Some do. You can tell by the sign.
Some regular dollar generals also offer very limited produce. Way less than the market stores. Seems to be the most rural ones in my experience
Didn’t know that! I’ve only seen Markets with produce and there’s only 1 I can think of around here. In any case it’s overpriced, but fair enough I guess for a small store without a dedicated produce section and staff. I something feel they added fresh produce to answer all the bitching about food desserts.
They have some that sell very limited produce and they also have an offshoot called Dollar General Market that’s a bit bigger and has a larger selection of produce.
Sometimes. The one in my hometown does.
They have a rodent problem also, not limited to one area
https://www.google.com/search?q=dollar+general+rodent+problem&udm=14
I believe they call that innovation.
Was just commenting that the new DG down the street is extraordinarily well run with happy employees. I’d like to take DG leadership by the neck and say, “You’re working for this manager for two months and you’re going to fucking learn whatever the hell she’s doing.”
Likely they are properly staffed.
Thought so to! But that’s a higher-level corporate decision, not down to the local manager, at least in my experience. Maybe DG incentivises local managers to be cheap on labor hours? My boss at Lowe’s had zero control over allocated hours.
I would guess so.
I’ve worked for franchise places. Number of workers was determined by higher ups. Much higher up.
Yes, and the self-checkout was wasted money as they all sit closed for some reason, they should have known it wasn’t practical, but I still go sometimes and wait in line since only one employee.
Ours vary a lot but one is pretty decent. Their prices are generally better than grocery or drug stores for name-brand things like ice cream, deodorant, and shampoo.
Are you sure that they are selling the same quantities? In mine they have many of the same products for sale in 2/3 or 1/2 sized packages and the unit costs are higher if you keep track.
You have to watch that sometimes, but for things like Arizona Iced Teas or Edy’s ice cream the quantities are the usual.
That’s always been the shtick for these types of stores. Small enough quantity that you end up paying more in the long run.
Sometimes you only need a small amount, though. And in those cases, it can be a good option.
Aren’t all stores deceptive in the US? Cos I’ve heard they don’t add the tax to the price tag. So you don’t know the real cost straight away.
No, because it’s known that’s sales tax will be added. It’s not like it’s hard to look up what the sales tax rate is in any given locality, and if you don’t care to look it up, just assume it’ll be 10% or less. We may not like it, but it’s not deceptive. It’s deceptive when the base price is altered from the displayed price on the shelf or in published ads.
Same goes in Canada, just a different way of doing things
Court-martialed. In the Dollar Military you get court-martialed.
Dollar General is probably going to get busted back to down to Dollar Colonel, or Dollar Major.
This seems serious enough to warrant a Dishonorable Dollar Discharge.
oh i got an ointment it cleared that right up
Does the cream work for dishonest, deceitful, dimwitted Presidents?
theoretically anything with large enough mass or velocity should
Plus Dollar Generals may be the only option in food deserts.
They are anti-competitive and actively work to make sure they’re the only option in those areas. It’s part of their business plan.
If anything they’re filling in the gaps walmart made for them.
Walmart opens and closes all the small mom and pop grocery stores for miles, we’re talking up to an hour drive away. Everyone that can drive an hour does because it’s cheaper. So stores close in a wide radius around a new Walmart.
Now you have these poorly connected rural areas that no longer have stores. The few people that can’t drive the hour to the Walmart are pretty throughly fucked.
Usually the only thing left are gas stations. They sell a few essentials, but they are prohibitively expensive. That’s where Dollar General steps in. They still out-compete any small buisness on prices, but they are usually more than Walmart. However they are priced close enough to make the drive to a walmart less practical for those that can. For those that can’t drive that distance they become their only source of groceries
Oh for sure, and then those areas get devastated even more when the Walmarts close because they decided they don’t do enough business.
There was enough there to run everyone else out but once that’s done Walmart might just shutdown and move on leaving people in those areas in the lurch.
Don’t get out in the country much? There are DGs in places that no mom and pop could survive. Of course they’ve stomped thousands of such stores out of business, but there are plenty of DGs down here where there was nothing before.
Don’t get out in the country much?
I do. That’s how I’m familiar with Dollar General since they target a lot more rural, whereas Dollar Tree seems to go after low income irban more often.
Of course they’ve stomped thousands of such stores out of business, but there are plenty of DGs down here where there was nothing before.
And there won’t be, because they are anti-competitive and actively work to make sure that won’t happen.
Thanks for replying though, I remember your username and that I opted not to block you the last time you commented some nonsense in reply to me. Fixing that now.
Jeeze dude, they were middling rude but you really love the “I’m blocking you” line. Blocking people to ensure you get the last word doesn’t actually work, y’know? It’s the last word for you but they can still… respond, and everyone else can still see that they’re getting the last word in. It’s pretty self-defeating.
edit: lmao oh right you blocked me at one point too, nvm.
Creating an agreeable echo chamber huh? I refuse to do so as I’m not afraid of disagreement, even if I find it ridiculous.
I guess dollar general didn’t even spend the money on necessary bribes.
This seems on brand.
I don’t go there because nothing costs a dollar
Im surprised Trump hasn’t pardoned them yet.
Yes, because that’s what’s important right now. Not like this hasn’t been a thing for 20+ years or anything… but let’s tackle this bullshit now
Nothing better to do I guess; at least nothing better to report without risking frivolous lawsuits. LAWSUITS, LAWSUITS, LAWSUITS, FOR EVERYONE
“Delay, deny, defend”. A weaponized justice system in-action
These sort of suits are how the ftc upholds rules that are already established, though? I wish they were more heavy handed but what else are you expecting them to do? This how they built legal precedent to both deter others from doing it and to bring more lawsuits forwards against other offenders.
Saw this story a few months ago and have been checking my receipts. My wife always has. We have yet to find an issue across the 3 or 4 DGs we go to. Maybe they tightened up since this story is getting traction in the public’s mind?
It’s probably an issue with certain district managers or store managers who are juicing their numbers. Retailers like that often offer bonuses based on hitting specific benchmarks for profits and such, so some managers may be padding their stats by overcharging customers.
Damn it Dollar General you were suppost to be the good guys
Oh no they aren’t. They’ve been horrible to their employees for decades now.
There’s a DG right outside my hood. You can tell how the employees are treated, but they try to be nice.
Down the street is a new DG and it’s like a different store. They never have openings and the couple of times I told employees they must have a good manager, they RAVED about her.
Managers can definitely make a lot of difference to the employees under them. Good ones will protect the employees as best they can from the larger organizational bullshit. Often at their own expense, whether mentally, career-wise, or in other ways. It’s not an easy task nor a light burden, so it’s nice to hear when there are examples out there.
Huh? Who the fuck told you that whopper?
Wait, isn’t this standard practice in America? Done openly and legally? And when we foreigners point out that the display price should be the amount of money you need to give to get the thing, Yanks get frustrated as they attempt to explain yet again that showing a price lower than the cost is normal and good?
No. You’re just lying about sales tax. Zero consumers like it. And that’s the only practice that seems to match what you’re intending to turn into a generalization of “every price is a lie and Americans love it!”
I’m not lying, I’m genuinely confused.
Based on how Americans online talk about shopping, it seems to me that if I go to America and see a $5 price tag on something, I have to pay more than $5 to get it, and Americans just accept this as normal.
What is different about what Dollar General is doing?
I am asking sincerely.
Because even though sales tax not being included in the list price is dumb, it is expected. You don’t get to the register and have a completely unrelated price. What DG is doing here, if I understand, is having the final price be completely decoupled from the list price.
I don’t know about you, but I don’t double check each line item on my receipt against the aisles after checkout. So while you might think it seems a bit high, you don’t automatically assume something fishy.
Thank you
What is different about what Dollar General is doing?
You see a $5.00 price tag on something, and at the register it rings up as $6.00 and then they add the 10% or whatever the local sales tax is for $6.60 … and they hope you don’t check your receipt.
Ah, thanks
I know it’s not sincere because this part was the lie.
they attempt to explain yet again that showing a price lower than the cost is normal and good?
That didn’t happen. Not to mention this article said absolutely nothing about sales tax which is what you were told is the only thing remotely like this, so it’s pretty obvious you weren’t genuinely confusing the two.
Getting used to something that sucks isn’t the same as accepting it. You ask 1000 people if they’d prefer this change, probably 998 would say yes. The 2 saying no would just be because they’re used to it.
Anyone that tells you they don’t know the price is playing dumb or is dumb. All you need to know is your state’s sale tax and do the math.
Sometimes you’ll get hit with a small city or county tax in an area you don’t know (usually 1-2%), but these are rare and in the most populus areas. Most places it’s just the state tax.
Point is if you are shopping in your home state in your home city you know exactly what you need to pay. Doing the math is inconvenient, I won’t argue that. But it’s not a total mystery. If someone were that concerned they can lookup tax rates and calculate.
What dollar general is doing is they are updating a price in their computer system, but not changing the tag. So an item with a $5 price tage should cost $5 plus the local tax. But in reality the item was $6 plus the local tax because dollar general didn’t change the price tag so you can’t know the price.
Don’t get me wrong I wish everything was included on the tag, but it’s not some unknowable random price. There are rules
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Problem being, our sales taxes vary by state, county and city and sometimes by area (like a beach hotel with higher taxes) and they can change every election. Aside from being a pain in the ass to keep up with labelling, no one wants to be the hero with “honest” pricing and go out of business for seeming more expensive.
If the cash register can manage to figure out granularity in the local taxes, so can the price tag printer. Updating tags every couple years after an election might be a pain, but it isn’t exactly a herculean task - they seem to manage it in places where tax-included pricing is required.
The problem is, as you say, no one wants to be the hero: No business wants to appear more expensive than competitors, and no legislator wants to be the one to make cost of living appear even higher.
If the cash register can manage to figure out granularity in the local taxes, so can the price tag printer.
That’s fine, until you have multiple locations in multiple jurisdictions, but you publish your prices in newspapers, radio, tv, etc.
in places where tax-included pricing is required
I’ve gotten the impression from comments that places like the EU are not nearly so granular in sales tax. Know if that’s true?
Anyway, this started long before tag printers and easy scans. It’s a sort of stupid, I dunno, “tradition” by now?
I did miss the part about political will! That’s a non-starter. NO politician would go for that. Just imagine the attack ads and couple that with how dumb we Americans are. “Did your prices go up after $asshole took office?!” Yeah.
It’s also because businesses don’t pay sales tax on their purchases. Only the end user pays sales tax. European businesses don’t either. They do pay VAT at the time of purchase, but they get to reclaim their VAT payments when they file their taxes. Only the end user actually pays VAT.
This is about the pre-tax unit price. They’re not supposed to lie about that.
you’re thinking of sales tax being added at the register. this is someone else.
Genuine question: What is the difference?
Made up numbers as an example:
Say you see something on the shelf with a $5 tag, and you know the sales tax is 10% in this area. You would calculate in your head that the price is a total of $5.50.
When you get to the register, the item rings up for $6, so with tax, you pay $6.60. This isn’t a “computer error” or a “price change they missed”, they are doing this on purpose to make money and hoping people don’t notice. If you’re only buying one item, you’ll see it easier, but if you by several items and your total is off couple dollars you might not notice…
On top of that, there’s typically one employee in the whole damn store, so if you do tell them something is wrong now you’re the Karen holding up the line over “just a dollar” while they have to go to the back of the store and verify what the shelf says.
It’s a combination of illegal business practices and social engineering done for profit by a major corporate entity, and I hope they burn for it.
Truthfully I don’t think Dollar General is doing it on purpose. I think they run their stores with such a minimal staff the price tags don’t get changed. Still their fault and still greed, but different reasons
I think that’s exactly what they want people to think so that they get away with it.
That’s a shit strategy since it’s still effectively the same crime
But it gives them plausible deniability.
“We didn’t steal all that money on purpose, we’re just so short staffed we made ‘mistakes’. We’re going to keep our millions of dollars and ‘promise’ to ‘do better’ once the government gives us a fine of a stern look and a finger waggle.”
Sales tax is expected to be added to the base price at the point of purchase, and the legislated tax rate is - ostensibly - public knowledge in whatever municipality the store is in.
If the prices on your items’ shelf tags are accurate, as is legally required, you can sum up all your items’ base prices, apply your locality’s tax rate to that subtotal, and get an accurate total before hitting the checkout.
This article is about the shelf tags or labels being out of line entirely with the base prices the register pulls out of the system, which is obviously illegal basically everywhere. You can’t display one price and surprise customers at the register with a different, higher price. This has nothing to do with sales tax added at the register and not shown on the tag.
No
Yeah, no.
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