Andy Garcia · freelance dev
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Ecommerce & Pricing

France Fined Boohoo €2.33 Million. 48% of the Discounts Investigators Checked Were Price Increases

October 19, 2026 7 min read

On August 20, 2026, France's consumer protection authority, the DGCCRF, announced a fine of €2,330,000 against BOOHOO.COM UK LTD, which the release describes as a Boohoo group subsidiary that sells clothing online (the London-listed parent rebranded as Debenhams Group in 2025). The case concerned the French version of boohoo.com. Investigators from the DGCCRF's national investigations service, the SNE, analyzed the prices of several hundred products: selling price, struck-through price and percentage off. Of the listings they checked, 40% offered no price cut at all, 7% offered a smaller cut than announced, and 48% were in fact price increases. In total, 95% were non-compliant.

The headline wrote itself: fast fashion fined. The useful part is how the DGCCRF measured it. In France, a reduction is not a number the merchant picks. It is a comparison with one specific past price, and that past price is a query any store database can run. I read the two-page release, the articles of the consumer code it rests on, and the EU Court of Justice's press release on its 2024 ruling about the EU rule those articles transpose. Here is what someone who runs promotions, or builds the software that runs them, can take from it.

What the investigators found

The release describes the mechanism in one sentence: by not taking into account promotions that had already been applied, and even by raising some prices before applying a reduction, Boohoo misled consumers about the reality of the reductions on offer. The DGCCRF adds that struck-through prices and "permanent promotions" give the consumer the impression of a very good deal and are likely to influence the purchase.

The same investigation found labelling problems. The words "cuir" (leather), "similicuir", "cuir simili" and "daim" (suede) were used to describe synthetic products, which the release calls prohibited. Information on the composition of textiles was non-compliant, and for shoes it was incomplete on the upper, the lining and the sole.

The procedure matters too. This was a transaction pénale, a settlement. With the agreement of the Paris public prosecutor, the DGCCRF proposed one global fine covering both the misleading practices and the labelling, and the company accepted it. The DGCCRF says it keeps watching how the practices evolve.

The rule: the lowest price of the last 30 days

Since May 28, 2022, article L112-1-1 of the French consumer code, which transposes the EU "Omnibus" directive 2019/2161, requires every announced price reduction to show the prior price. That prior price is the lowest price the trader charged all consumers during the 30 days before the reduction. The trader stays free to display the cut as an amount, a percentage or a struck-through price, and the rule applies online and in shops.

There are three carve-outs. For successive reductions during a set period, the reference is the price before the first reduction. Perishable goods at risk of rapid deterioration are excluded. And comparisons with other traders' prices fall outside the rule, but the DGCCRF's practical sheet says the consumer must then be told clearly that it is a comparison, not a reduction, and what the reference is, such as a manufacturer's recommended price.

One more piece comes from the EU Court of Justice. In Aldi Süd (C-330/23), decided on September 26, 2024, a German consumer association had argued that simply displaying the 30-day low was not enough. The court's answer: a reduction announced as a percentage, or as a promotional claim stressing a good price, must be determined on the basis of that 30-day low. In one of the examples in the case, the price just before the offer was €1.69, the 30-day low was €1.29, and the "reduced" price was €1.29.

How a sale turns into a price increase

The release publishes no product-level prices, so here are my own numbers on a hypothetical top, one for each of the DGCCRF's three buckets.

No reduction. The top sells at €30. Two weeks ago it ran a three-day flash sale at €20, then went back to €30. Today the page shows €30 struck through, minus 33%, €20. The lowest price of the last 30 days is €20. The real reduction is zero.

A smaller reduction than announced. Another top has sold at €30 for months. The merchant moves it to €40 for a week, then shows €40 struck through, minus 50%, €20. The 30-day low is €30, so the real cut is €10 on €30, or 33%, not 50%.

A price increase. Back to the first top, with its €20 flash sale two weeks ago. The merchant raises it to €50 for a few days, then shows €50 struck through, minus 50%, €25. Against the €20 low, the customer pays 25% more than two weeks earlier, under a banner announcing half price.

The first case is what "not taking into account promotions previously applied" looks like in a database. The second and third are what "raising some prices before applying a reduction" looks like. None of them needs a price that was never charged. They only need the system to forget the last 30 days.

What the release does not show

The sample is "several hundred products", with no exact count and no selection method. The release gives no period either: the only dates come from the company. The 95% describes the listings the investigators checked, not the whole catalogue. If the checks targeted listings that already looked suspicious, the rate says little about the rest.

The release gives one global amount. It does not split the €2.33 million between the promotions and the labelling.

A settlement is not a trial, and the release does not quote Boohoo. The company answered through the press. A Boohoo spokesperson, quoted by PA Media, said that "these historic issues relate to a period from October 2023 to February 2024, when the business was under previous management, and are now resolved", adding: "We have co-operated fully with the regulator, and continue to review how we price and label our products." The DGCCRF release confirms neither the period nor that the practices have stopped; it says only that the agency keeps watching how they evolve.

The release also does not accuse Boohoo of fake countdown timers. Fake urgency is covered by a separate rule: article L121-4 of the consumer code lists, among the practices deemed misleading, falsely stating that a product will be available only for a very limited time in order to obtain an immediate decision.

Separately, the Journal du Net reported on September 18 a second fine of €220,000 against the brand for deficient information on the environmental quality of its products. I did not find that one on the DGCCRF pages I read.

What it can cost

Article L132-2 of the consumer code punishes misleading commercial practices with two years in prison and a €300,000 fine. In its current version, it raises that to five years and €750,000 when the offence is committed online. The fine can also be raised, in proportion to the benefit drawn, to 10% of average annual turnover over the last three known years, or to 50% of the spending on the advertising or practice. Article 131-38 of the penal code sets a company's maximum at five times an individual's. A settlement under article L523-1 must stay below the maximum, and can come with obligations to stop the practice, prevent its repetition and repair the harm to consumers.

The DGCCRF says it checks these rules during national sales events, naming the soldes and Black Friday, and that it uses reports filed on SignalConso to target its checks.

What I would build before the next sale

I read this case as a developer, and it is a data problem before it is a legal one. If I were building or auditing a store that sells to French customers, this is the list I would work through.

Keep a price history. Every price change, per product and per variant, with a timestamp. Without it, you cannot compute the reference price, and you cannot show an investigator that you did.

Compute the struck-through price, never type it. The reference is the minimum of that history over the 30 days before the promotion starts, and the percentage is computed from it, as the Aldi Süd ruling requires.

Make the back office refuse a promotion whose reference price is above the 30-day low. A validation rule with a test beats a memo to the marketing team.

Plan successive markdowns as one declared period, so the price before the first markdown stays the reference. Space separate promotions so the last one has left the 30-day window before the next one starts.

Label comparisons as comparisons. A manufacturer's recommended price can be shown if you say that is what it is.

Only run a countdown if the offer really ends when it reaches zero.

And read the product descriptions too. The same investigation found "leather" on synthetic products.

A discount is a claim about the past. In France, the past is the last 30 days, and the DGCCRF reads the price history.

Sources

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