The competition regulator has been armed with new powers to monitor the pricing policies of the Coles and Woolworths supermarket chains. What is being prohibited is "excessive pricing"

The competition authority, the ACCC, has released this statement.

The ACCC will begin monitoring supermarket pricing from 1 July when the new excessive pricing prohibition comes into force.

The prohibition applies to very large supermarket retailers that have an annual revenue of more than $30 billion, which currently captures only Coles and Woolworths.

New guidelines, published today, outline how the ACCC will monitor compliance with the prohibition and how it will assess whether Coles or Woolworths have engaged in excessive pricing.

Under the prohibition, there is no fixed threshold for what is an excessive price for a grocery product. Instead, the ACCC will monitor supermarket pricing information and consider all relevant circumstances, including the cost to supply the product to consumers and what is a reasonable margin for the supermarket, to determine if a grocery product was excessively priced.  

“We know that grocery prices continue to be a key concern for households. The excessive pricing prohibition provides us with another tool within our broader toolkit to protect consumers and promote competition in the supermarket sector,” ACCC Acting Chair Catriona Lowe said.

“Our initial focus for the prohibition will be on monitoring Coles and Woolworth’s pricing information to ensure they comply with their obligations.”

The ACCC will prioritise its monitoring on a select group of products, which will be chosen based on consumer and supplier reports as well as information obtained from supermarkets, including on prices, margins and sales revenue.

“We will focus our attention on products where excessive pricing is likely to cause the most harm to consumers,” Ms Lowe said.

“We encourage consumers and suppliers to make a report to the ACCC if they have concerns that a supermarket may have excessively priced a grocery product. These reports will help us identify products that may warrant further investigation.”

Over the coming months, the ACCC will select and publish the initial focus products that it will examine more closely.

The ACCC will provide regular updates on its compliance monitoring under the prohibition to help strengthen public transparency around supermarket pricing.

“We recognise that there is significant public interest in the ACCC’s ongoing work to ensure supermarkets act in accordance with the law,” Ms Lowe said.

ACCC’s broader enforcement powers remain integral to addressing supermarket misconduct

The excessive pricing prohibition complements the existing competition and consumer laws that the ACCC is responsible for administering. The ACCC will continue to use a range of tools to ensure supermarkets to comply with these laws.

“In deciding which compliance or enforcement tool to use, our first priority is always to achieve the best possible outcome for the community and to manage risk proportionately.”

“If we observe non-compliance then we would consider the most appropriate enforcement tool to address any misconduct,” Ms Lowe said.

Background

On 14 December 2025, the Australian Government announced a supermarkets excessive pricing prohibition. The prohibition was implemented as an amendment to the Food and Grocery Code.

The prohibition introduces a new purpose to the Food and Grocery Code, which is to promote workably competitive outcomes in grocery product markets and protect the welfare of consumers by prohibiting excessive pricing for grocery products by very large retailers.

The ACCC is responsible for enforcing compliance with the Food and Grocery Code, including the excessive pricing prohibition.

The prohibition includes various elements the ACCC will need to consider in assessing compliance, including:

• whether the corporation is a very large retailer
• whether there has been a supply or an offer to supply of a kind of grocery product to a consumer by way of retail sale
• the kind of grocery product
• the pricing for the supply of the kind of grocery product
• the costs to the very large retailer of the supply of the kind of grocery product
• whether the pricing is ‘significantly excessive’ compared to the cost of supply plus a reasonable margin, with consideration given to relevant circumstances.

The ACCC has information on its website about what’s allowed when setting prices.