Consumer watchdog ACM has told businesses to stop “misleading” reductions listing prices for goods that have never been charged.

Strict European rules apply to “sale” prices”: the cost of goods must be clearly advertised and company must clearly state the reference price for which something has been on sale for the past 30 days if there is a reduction.

However, Dutch consumers are being encouraged to report businesses that do not follow the rules to the ACM, which can apply sanctions and fines.

Edwin van Houten, consumer director at ACM, said in a press release that companies are not following the spirit or the letter of the law. “With the introduction of stricter rules for ‘past/reduced’ prices, we saw all kinds of new tricks to present discounts more attractively,” he said. “For example, we saw that the ‘past’ price was temporarily increased to make the discount appear bigger, or discounts based on recommended prices that were never actually applied. This is not allowed.”

The consumer protection group has published a list of guidelines with examples to explain the situation better to businesses who are unclear of the law.

It will be checking whether physical stores and online marketplaces are complying with the law before using “various enforcement tools”. People who suspect a business of unfair pricing can report it via the ACM ConsuWijzer.