Google announced that it will start enforcing price accuracy between the Merchant Center feeds and checkout. This has been a long standing policy for requiring merchants to show the price of an item from their Google Merchant Feed on their ecommerce page – all the way through the checkout process. If you as a merchant, show a higher price than what’s on your landing page, Google can suspend your account.

Google Posted Some Guidelines

Google has also posted some guidelines for the checkout requirements. Customers see a price and expect to pay the advertised price for the product. If the price is different from the price shown in the customer’s shopping cart, it create a very negative customer experience. This results in the loss of sales. Well, make it clear at the first customer interaction about what they will be paying for the product. Also mention if there are any shipping charges. If there is a lower price at checkout or some discount of some kind is added – that may not be a problem. If the price increases – that definitely resonates negatively with the customer.

Google Enforced This

Beginning April 6, in addition to reviewing and enforcing price accuracy between the Merchant Center accounts data and your landing pages, Google will also begin to review and enforce price accuracy at checkout.

So, What’s the Consequence?

A penalty. Google also said that if this rule is violated, you will receive a 28 day warning to resolve the mismatched prices. Your account will be subject to suspension at the end of the warning period. Google enforces this by using automated bots.

So, if you are sunning an ecommerce store, you should ensure that the price displayed on the site and at the time of checkout is exactly the same as the one on the landing page. Consistent and accurate pricing is one of the most important factors shoppers take into consideration when making a purchase.