Discount and Environmental Claim Rules in E-Commerce

The new advertising rules land in the middle of e-commerce operations: discount display and product descriptions. Both have a counterpart on the software side.

01. The Previous Price Problem

A discount claim must rest on a price genuinely applied before. Raising the price ahead of a campaign and then showing a discount is exactly the practice the regulation targets.

02. Price History Records

The technical counterpart is storing every product's price change history with a timestamp. Most e-commerce platforms hold this data but don't expose it in reportable form; it has to be extractable when needed.

03. Campaign Design

How basket discounts, coupons and multi-buy campaigns affect the final price must be clear to the user. Where several discounts stack, the display gets confusing and can become misleading.

04. Environmental Wording

Terms like recycled, eco-friendly and carbon neutral in product descriptions must rest on documentation. Risk accumulates in stores that publish supplier-provided product text as-is.

05. The Supplier Chain

Documentation for an environmental claim may sit with the supplier, but responsibility sits with the seller. Opening a field that requires that document at product creation is easier than a bulk sweep later.

06. The Audit Calendar

August was set as the month in which medium, large and very large e-commerce service providers submit their independent audit reports to the Ministry. If you're at that scale, plan your calendar accordingly.