The Federal Court has declared that Dell Australia misled customers by making false and misleading representations about the prices of add-on monitors and in ‘strikethrough’ prices shown on the website.

When shoppers selected a desktop, laptop, or notebook on Dell Australia’s website, they were offered a monitor bundling option, which was “often shown with a higher strikethrough price, representing a significant saving if purchased with the computer.”

Dell Australia admitted the monitors were not sold for the ‘strikethrough’ price for most of the relevant time, and that sometimes the bundling price was actually more expensive than simply buying the monitor separately.

Dell Australia also admitted that it made misleading statements about the value of any discounts, with wording such as “Total Savings”, “Includes x% off”, “Discounted Price” and “Get the best price for popular accessories when purchased with this product”.

Dell Australia sold more than 5,300 add-on monitors with overstated discounts, and has since refunded or agreed to offer compensation to more than 4,250 affected consumers. Aussie consumers paid Dell more than $2 million for add-on monitors between August 2019 and mid-December 2021.

“We brought these proceedings because we were concerned that Dell Australia had misled its consumers with false representations about its pricing and discounts,” ACCC Commissioner Liza Carver said.

Credit: Dell

“In some cases, consumers paid more for the add-on monitor advertised as ‘discounted’ than they would have paid if they had bought it as a stand-alone product, which is shocking,” Ms Carver said.

“As the Court noted, price and discounts are key differentiating factors for consumers deciding between product offers, and this case reinforces the importance of retailers displaying genuine ‘was/now’ pricing and accurate savings.

“This case serves as an important reminder to businesses that suggestive upselling or bunding of products must not mislead consumers as to the deal they are getting.”

Dell Australia has been ordered by the Federal Court to offer full or partial refunds to affected consumers; to appoint an independent compliance professional to review its compliance program; and to issue corrective notices to every consumer that purchased an add-on Monitor through the Dell Australia website between August 2019 and December 2021.

Penalties and costs will be awarded at a later date.