Convenience Store Overpricing: Intentional?

Five US House members have called out pricing practices at the US’s two largest convenience store chains in response to a Guardian investigation. 7-Eleven and Circle K stores were found to frequently charge customers more at the register and/or pump for snacks, gas and other items than prices labeled on shelves and signs.

The key word here is “frequently”. Barring digital pricing where computers would change listed prices and register prices simultaneously, there is bound to be some overlap. I believe occasional discrepancies should be expected.

Becca Balint, a Vermont Democrat, stated, “It’s enraging that these massive companies are now essentially forcing us to fact-check every price tag and receipt just to make sure we’re not getting ripped off.” She said the stores have a responsibility to make sure the price we see on the shelf is the price we pay at the register.” Arguably, it should be. However, I’m also guessing she never ran the pricing system in a store, or she’d realize perfection isn’t possible.

She called on the Federal Trade Commission to “investigate this trend and hold these companies accountable if they’re deliberately misleading customers”. That statement contained yet another keyword – “if”. While some pricing overlap should be expected, deliberate misrepresentation would definitely be fraudulent.

Nannette Barragan, California, stated, “Americans work hard to feed their families. As Trump and Republicans continue to skyrocket the cost of food and other basic necessities, businesses need to keep their prices transparent and fair.” I’m fairly confident most of them do. Any good business owner knows that intentionally screwing over customers is usually the best way to go out of business.

The Guardian’s convenience store investigation included a review of customer complaints, along with state and local price-accuracy inspections. Between 2023 and 2025, 7-Eleven failed 41% of its price inspections in Arizona and 47% of price inspections in both Colorado and Utah. Over the same span, Circle K failed 35% of its inspections in Florida, 39% in Arizona and 62% in North Carolina.

That begs the question, “Just what does it take to fail a price-accuracy inspection?” Does one inaccuracy mean a failure? Is it a certain percentage of items tested? Is it just the item that received a complaint? From what little I could find, the NIST requires 98% accuracy. That’s 49 out of every 50 items that must be accurate. That’s seems to be very demanding when register and physical pricing exist side by side. Digital pricing, which many are against, could greatly help accuracy.

Perhaps the best thing “always open” stores could do would be to lower prices (be it sale or otherwise) on the registers before posting the lower price on the shelf. Then follow up with the reverse when prices rise – post the higher price on the shelf before raising the price on the register. This way, the customer always receives the lower price during any overlap. Stores that are closed for any significant time during a 24-hour period should be able to coordinate register and physical pricing while closed.

Either way, 98% accuracy in anything other than parachutes is very demanding.

Source used: Guardian

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