Price watch

Updated 28 April 2026

ACCC grocery enforcement: what to expect from July

How will the ACCC enforce the price gouging ban? What does enforcement history tell us, and what can retailers get away with?

What the ACCC has actually done with retail price enforcement.

The ACCC's track record with retail pricing is limited. The agency has strong precedent in competition (merger review, cartels, misleading conduct) but minimal enforcement history on excessive pricing in grocery retail specifically. This matters, because it means the enforcement regime in July 2026 will be building largely on precedent from outside grocery.

Recent relevant enforcement actions include:

• Fuel price monitoring. The ACCC publishes weekly fuel price reports and has issued "statements of concern" when prices appear inconsistent with wholesale costs, but this is monitoring and naming-and-shaming, not enforcement action.
• Misleading price conduct. The ACCC has prosecuted cases under the Australian Consumer Law where retailers made false price claims (illusory discounts, false comparison prices). These are precedents for how courts view retail pricing conduct, though not specifically about excessive pricing.
• Password management services. In 2022, the ACCC took action against Kmart and other retailers for pricing practices that were unconscionable or misleading. This shows the agency has appetite for retail pricing scrutiny, though the law required consumer deception, not just excessive prices.

The excessive pricing prohibition is new law for grocery. The ACCC will have discretion in how it interprets "significantly excessive" and how much evidence it requires.

How enforcement will likely work.

Based on the ACCC's own statements, enforcement is expected to start with the clearest cases: products where the pricing gap is wide, sustained, and unjustifiable by reference to cost of supply.

The likely enforcement pathway will be:

1. Price monitoring and data analysis. The ACCC will use publicly available price data (including from Pinch and other price trackers) to identify product categories and price points that appear anomalous.
2. Voluntary information requests. The ACCC will ask Coles and Woolworths to provide their cost of supply data for specific products. Retailers are required to respond to ACCC information requests under the Competition and Consumer Act.
3. Assessment against "significantly excessive" test. If the data shows a price is above cost-plus-reasonable-margin by a material amount, the ACCC will move to investigation.
4. Formal investigation. The ACCC will obtain detailed supply chain data, examine whether there are legitimate reasons for the price, and determine whether to take action.
5. Enforcement action or undertakings. The ACCC can seek court orders requiring price reductions or accept a formal undertaking from the retailer to adjust pricing. Courts have substantial discretion in penalty amounts.

What enforcement will probably not touch.

The ban's definition of "significantly excessive" creates enforcement challenges. The law avoids prescribing a fixed formula (for example, "no margin over 10%"). This flexibility lets the ACCC adjust to different categories, but it also means:

• Modest overpricing is hard to prove. If the ACCC alleges a price is 5% above the legal threshold, the retailer will argue that "reasonable margin" includes that 5%, and the ACCC will have to litigate. Litigation is slow and expensive. Enforcement will focus on clear-cut cases.
• Price cycling will be difficult to address. If a retailer cycles a product from $5.00 to $6.00 to $4.50 to $6.00, each individual price could be legal, even if the high prices are excessive. The law targets pricing, not pricing practices, which is a meaningful gap.
• Shrinkflation is off-limits. If butter shrinks from 500g to 450g and the price stays at $4.50, the unit price increases but the ban does not cover quantity reductions, only prices.
• Legitimate cost increases will be hard to challenge. If the cost of inputs genuinely rises and retailers pass that through, the ban does not apply. The ACCC will have to prove the cost increase is fabricated or exaggerated.

Timeline for first enforcement actions.

The ACCC has said enforcement action can be expected as early as H2 2026 (starting July). But "expected" does not mean immediate. Building a case requires:

• Data collection and analysis (weeks)
• Information requests to retailers (weeks)
• Detailed investigation (months)
• Legal assessment of whether a breach is likely to be proven (weeks)

First enforcement action in H2 2026 is possible. But the first cases will be the clearest ones. Systemic enforcement across many products or many cases will likely take 12 to 24 months to materialise.

What you can do.

The ACCC accepts complaints from the public through its ACCConnect website. If you notice a price that seems egregiously high compared to input costs (for example, beef mince at $18/kg when it was $12/kg three months ago with no cost justification), you can lodge a complaint. The ACCC receives thousands; only those showing a clear pattern across multiple consumers or products will trigger investigation.

More useful: track prices yourself using Pinch. The enforcement regime depends on the data being visible. If prices shift from July 1, you will be the first to know.