The £4.2m CMA sledgehammer over drip pricing that is totally out of proportion

cityam04-17

The AA has been fined for a £3 booking fee added at the checkout There’s a particular kind of institutional vanity that mistakes noise for impact. It’s particularly prevalent in Whitehall and abundant...

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The penalty: 4.2m, a press release, and the unmistakable satisfaction of a regulator road-testing its new powers on a famous name.","collect":0,"end_time":0,"defaultTopTitle":"cityam.com","property":[],"viewcount":null,"language":"en","relate_stocks":{"BK4588":"碎股","CMA":"联信银行","BK4585":"ETF&股票定投概念","BK4589":"SVB概念","BK4207":"综合性银行","BK4211":"区域性银行"},"translate_title":"CMA对drip定价的420万英镑大锤完全不成比例","themeId":null,"isJumpTheme":false,"ttsUrl":null,"symbols_score_info":{"CMA":1.5},"content_text":"The AA has been fined for a £3 booking fee added at the checkout There’s a particular kind of institutional vanity that mistakes noise for impact. It’s particularly prevalent in Whitehall and abundant especially in those – like many in our government today – who have only ever worked in the bureaucratic state or legal profession.The CMA’s triumphant announcement this week — it’s very first fine under the new Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act (DMCCA) — has that feel about it.The offence? A £3 booking fee added at checkout rather than displayed upfront by the AA and BSM driving schools. The penalty: £4.2m, a press release, and the unmistakable satisfaction of a regulator road-testing its new powers on a famous name.\n\nDrip pricing is genuinely irritating. A bit like all the stealth taxes government itself levies. I’m not here to defend sloppy website architecture. But irritating is not the same as harmful, and not all harms are created equal. There must still be a role for the free-will of consenting adults and the legal doctrine of caveat emptor (buyer beware).\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNews Updates\nStay ahead with our three daily briefings delivering all the key market moves, top business and political stories, and incisive analysis straight to your inbox.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nThe CMA has secured a refund for around 80,000 learner drivers. Nine pounds. Barely sufficient for one of Rachel Reeves’ expensive pints of beer and a packet of crisps. Not nothing — but not the systemic exploitation that warrants a multimillion-pound public flogging either.What makes this harder to dismiss as routine enforcement is how the AA apparently behaved when challenged. They admitted the fault, fixed the website and agreed to automatic refunds — no hoops, no claim forms, no small print. Quietly and quickly sorted. Harm remedied.But that’s not how bureaucracy works. The quest for more powers, more staff and more money requires a constant stream of headlines. 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