National watchdog to monitor 'fake' Black Friday sales in Spain

Although Black Friday takes place on the last Friday in November, the promotion of the sales campaign starts much earlier and advertisements are already filling shop windows, department stores and the web sites of technology giants. What buyers must be aware of, however, as Spain's Ministry of Consumer Affairs has pointed out, is that some companies advertise fake discounts to take advantage of the inflow they receive during the biggest sale promotion.

Such irregular practices have happened in previous years, as the ministry headed by Pablo Bustinduy has detected. For this reason, the government department has launched a campaign to detect such fraudulent sales.

One example is raising prices in the weeks leading up to Black Friday just to lower them to the original number on the big shopping day. This means that the end consumer buys a product with no discount.

During the 2024 campaign, the Ministry of Consumer Affairs sanctioned seven large companies with 350,000 euros, banning them from repeating these misleading practices. The fines imposed can be "up to six or eight times the illicit profit obtained". "The time of impunity is over and whoever resorts to these practices will pay for it," minister Bustinduy said.

Although the names of the sanctioned companies were not revealed, the ministry did give an example of one of the cases detected two years ago. Between 15 and 20 November 2023, a company offered a laptop for 626.99 euros. On 21 November, the price was increased to 759.99 euros and between 22 and 29 November (coinciding with Black Friday), it went back down to the initial 626.99 euros.

This year, in addition to the fake sales prosecuted on previous occasions, the ministry is expanding the range of unfair commercial practices that will be monitored and sanctioned. Authorities will focus their investigation on e-commerce operators and textile products, toys, technology and small household appliances.

Another illegal practice is the so-called drip pricing: a sales technique where only part of the total cost of a product is advertised, for any additional fees or taxes to be announced later.

Pressuring a consumer to purchase a product will also be fined. Examples include unrealistic countdown clocks, false scarcity messages or any other device designed to provoke an artificial sense of urgency, which seeks to make the consumer unconsciously make hasty decisions.

"No business model can be based on the violation of consumers' rights," Bustinduy stated.