Advocate: PriceCheck app won’t bring real savings

The Barbados Private Sector Association (BPSA) expressed concern Monday about the implications of PriceCheck, a new government price comparison app, particularly regarding the concept of “approved price margins”.

But Acting Director of Consumer Affairs Bertram Johnson pushed back on suggestions that the government was seeking to impose price controls. He clarified that no official price margin mandate exists for retailers, despite references to pricing outliers in the app’s internal system.

The PriceCheck app is a free service by the Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs, designed to give consumers up-to-date information on essential goods and help them find the best deals. Johnson has hailed the app as a “milestone achievement” saying it was a key step in digitising the department’s services and meeting consumer needs.

BPSA chairman Trisha Tannis voiced her concerns following Johnson’s comments during the PriceCheck launch. Tannis said she was particularly interested in understanding whether the government had introduced a new approved price margin, a measure not currently in use within the private sector.

Tannis told Barbados TODAY: “The only thing I would query is reference to ‘approved margins’ because I am not aware that we have approved margins at play anymore. That was a term more relevant under the social compact where we had mutually agreed margins. Maybe that can be clarified by the minister, or by the consumer affairs department.”

During the app’s launch, Johnson explained that the platform, now in its first phase of a four-stage rollout, can flag prices that significantly differ from the average, which may then be investigated by the Department of Consumer Affairs.

Johnson said: “Let’s say you had butter that was selling at $2.55 or $2.65; then you see $10 for that same product, which is an outlier. We would pick it up even before we publish it and investigate it to see if it was an error in recording or if that was actually the price they were selling it at.”

The consumer affairs department would then investigate to determine why the price was outside the average markup range, he added.

Tannis acknowledged that the private sector was aware of the government’s move to bring transparency to food prices, having previously done so manually through printed comparative prices. However, she emphasised the need for clarity on the term “approved margins” and its relevance.

“We just want to make sure that we have a common definition of what agreed margins are, or approved margins, or relevant margins…because we are not aware that those are currently in play,” Tannis remarked.

She added that while the platform should foster fair competition and help reduce prices, several factors, such as procurement and shipping costs, could create temporary disparities.

Criticism of the PriceCheck app has also come from the consumer rights organisation Barbados Consumer Empowerment Network (BCEN). Executive Director Maureen Holder argued that it would not address the core issues affecting Barbadian consumers, and expressed scepticism about its ability to reduce prices.

“What they did, instead of focusing on what is being sought, which is relief in their pockets, they’ve gone for an app which traps Barbadians into believing that this will actually save them money. But it can’t guarantee it will save them money,” Holder told
Barbados TODAY.

She added that most Barbadians are unlikely to travel long distances for minimal savings, noting, “That’s not what Barbadians want at this point in time. We want to see prices coming down.”

emmanueljoseph@barbadostoday.bb