Fixing a mismatch between the ad and the advertised price

If a search ad promises a price the landing page cannot honour, pause or correct the ad while you investigate. Don’t leave visitors seeing conflicting terms while you wait for a weekly report.

Identify where the mismatch starts. Possible causes include an expired promotion, a region-specific price, a variant difference or a stale page cache.

Record the exact ad wording, query context, landing page, location, device and time. Follow the path as an eligible customer and compare the price on the first screen and at checkout.

Compare the full price, including taxes, mandatory fees and delivery, and check eligibility. Check whether an unavoidable fee, charge or surcharge is missing from a represented single price; omitting a mandatory charge may breach the Australian Consumer Law.

The relevant law is the Australian Consumer Law, in Schedule 2 to the Competition and Consumer Act 2010. A price claim that creates a false or misleading impression about the true cost may breach it.

Use the ACCC’s Price displays guidance and False or misleading claims guidance when reviewing the claim. The ACCC says advertised claims should be true, accurate and based on reasonable grounds, and that businesses must be able to prove them.

If the offer applies only to one variant or time period, state that clearly in the ad and on the page. If the offer no longer exists, replace the claim with one the price path can honour.

Correct the ad wording to match the actual offer, and correct the page and checkout price so the same offer is honoured throughout the path. If you cannot confirm the price, keep the ad paused until the discrepancy is resolved.

The ACCC accepts reports about misleading behaviour and can investigate possible breaches of price-display rules. It does not give legal advice to businesses about how they display prices, and it does not resolve individual disputes about price displays.

Ask the responsible pricing or legal team to assess a material discrepancy. The copy fix should match the actual offer.

After correction, test the full path again and record which campaigns used the old claim. Set an expiry owner and a routine price feed or manual review so the same mismatch does not return at the next promotion change.

Pros and cons of keeping a mismatched ad live while investigating

Key facts about price display compliance in Australia