Czech Constitutional Court rejects Albert's appeal over fines for fake discounts

The Czech Constitutional Court has rejected an appeal by the Albert supermarket chain, which had sought to overturn fines totaling 490,000 crowns for misleading customers with fake discounts. According to the trade inspection authority and the administrative courts, the chain systematically calculated discount percentages not from the lowest price of a product over the previous 30 days, but from inflated reference prices, making the promotions appear more attractive than they actually were.

How customers were misled

According to the inspection authority, the genuine lowest price of a product over the past 30 days was printed in tiny type at the very bottom of the price tag — in a spot where it was easy to overlook. Meanwhile, shoppers' attention was drawn to a large, eye-catching "bargain" price labeled "SALE," alongside a crossed-out "regular" price and a discount percentage calculated from that inflated figure. Not only in-store price tags but also the chain's promotional flyers were designed in the same misleading way.

Albert: the fines violate our rights

The chain unsuccessfully challenged the fines first in ordinary courts, then before the Supreme Administrative Court, before eventually turning to the Constitutional Court. In its complaint, the company argued that it had effectively been punished multiple times for the same violation — the Czech Trade Inspection Authority had repeatedly opened proceedings and imposed sanctions over a situation stemming from a single, centralized pricing policy decision applied across all of the chain's stores. Albert argued that the cumulative fines had grown so large that they infringed on the company's constitutional right to property.

However, reporting judge Kateřina Ronovská and the Constitutional Court panel disagreed with these arguments. In a ruling published on Tuesday, the court stated that the company's disagreement with the content and reasoning of the contested judicial decisions cannot be equated with those decisions being insufficiently justified.

Prices must be unambiguous

The court also dismissed the argument that fining similar violations across different stores was unfair. In the Constitutional Court's view, the chain's stores in different regions serve different catchment areas and customer groups that barely overlap, meaning that discount information at each individual store affects different consumers in different ways.

The administrative courts based their rulings primarily on a decision of the European Court of Justice, according to which the price of a product offered to consumers must be unambiguous, easily identifiable and clearly legible. As the courts emphasized, what matters most for the average shopper is that discount information be clear, transparent, accurate, and not distort the perceived benefit of a promotion.

Source: novinky.cz