OTTAWA – The Canadian unit of Amazon.com will pay a $1 million fine to settle an investigation into pricing activities on its website that gave an inaccurate view of how much consumers could save, Canada’s competition watchdog said on Wednesday.
After a two-year investigation, the Competition Bureau found that Amazon’s practice of comparing its prices to regular prices on its Canadian site gave consumers the impression that the website was selling items at a price lower than the general market.
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The Competition Bureau said Amazon relied on its suppliers to provide list prices without verifying their accuracy and advertised the savings on its site and in other places.
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Amazon has already made changes to the way it advertises regular prices on its Canadian website to more accurately show potential savings, the watchdog said.
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In addition to the penalty, Amazon will pay $100,000 toward the Competition Bureau’s costs.
Amazon officials were not immediately available for comment.