Personalised Pricing in the Digital Era

28 November 2018 Paris

As data analytics and pricing algorithms become common business practice in the digital era, there are growing concerns about the possibility that companies use such tools to engage in personalised pricing, a form of price discrimination that involves charging different prices to consumers according to their willingness to pay. While personalised pricing has the potential to improve allocative efficiency and benefit low-end consumers who would otherwise be underserved, in some occasions it can also lead to a loss in total consumer welfare. Moreover, if these practices are conducted using non-transparent or deceptive means, there is also a risk that they reduce market trust and create a perception of unfairness, potentially dampening consumer participation in digital markets.

In November 2018, the OECD Consumer Protection and Competition committees jointly discussed the ambiguous and multi-dimensional effects of personalised pricing, notably whether the risks of personalised pricing deserve a policy intervention and, if so, what are the most appropriate competition and consumer protection tools to address them.

All related materials for the discussion are available on this page.

» Read the OECD background note

» View the full list of OECD best practice roundtables on competition policy

INVITED SPEAKER

Alexandre DE STREEL Bio ‌
Professor of EU Law at UNamur presenting The regulation of personalised pricing in the digital era