Government under pressure to price control essential items to prevent profiteering
10 April 2020, 00:00
Groups are calling on the government to place price controls on essential items being sold online to prevent profiteering during the coronavirus pandemic.
It comes after consumer group Which? said it had found more evidence of items such as handwash, cleaning products and baby formula for sale online at greatly inflated prices.
Last month, Which? and regulator the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) urged more action to be taken to stop the practice, and the Prime Minister warned profiteering during the crisis would not be tolerated.
However, Which? said it has found hundreds more cases on platforms such as Amazon and eBay.
Despite many listings being removed by both firms, the consumer group said it had found new listings, including bottles of Carex handwash priced at £40 and Dettol cleaner priced at £59.99.
Researchers for Which? also said they found what appeared to be listings which had been previously removed by Amazon back on the site with inflated prices.
Which? said it was now time for the Government to step in with emergency legislation to cap prices on essential products to stop the practice from continuing.
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Sue Davies, head of consumer protection at Which?, said: "Amazon and eBay seem unable to stop coronavirus profiteering, leaving some unscrupulous sellers to have a field day exploiting people by selling essential items at appallingly high prices.
"It is time for the Government, working with the CMA, to step in with strong action to stamp out price gouging and keep the price of vital goods reasonable during this difficult time."
In a statement given to Which?, eBay said: "We have extremely effective measures in place to combat price gouging - something that we've communicated to Which? multiple times - with heavy restrictions on the listing of some in-demand products at unreasonable prices, resulting in five million automatically blocked attempts to price gouge, an additional 600,000 removed, and thousands of seller accounts suspended."
Amazon told Which?: "There is no place for price gouging on Amazon.
"We are disappointed that bad actors are attempting to artificially raise prices on basic need products during a global health crisis and, in line with our long-standing policy, have recently blocked or removed hundreds of thousands of offers.
"We continue to actively monitor our store and remove offers that violate our policies."
