The House of Commons Business and Trade Select Committee has issued a very short-notice call for evidence about variable pricing.  With reports that the head of the CMA has been replaced by ministers in the drive for a regulatory focus on growth, the Committee is asking how consumer and competition protections should be balanced with businesses' search for profit.

It is interested in dynamic pricing that recently came to major public attention when fans queued online for hours to secure Oasis concert tickets, only to find the price had rocketed out of reach while they waited. The Committee also mentions drip pricing, online choice architecture and points out that some pub chains have also begun charging higher prices for pints at peak times. 

The government and the CMA are currently considering some of these issues, including a consultation about resale of live events tickets and the CMA is investigating dynamic pricing.

The Committee highlights that varying prices allows businesses to manage costs, allow certain groups to better access otherwise pricey goods and services, and cope with changes in supply and demand.  

The Committee is now urgently calling for views, to be submitted by 30 January, on these questions: 

• What are the reasons that businesses may need to dynamically adjust prices - as in surge-pricing on a rideshare or delivery app - or offer different prices to certain groups, like a discounted 'student ticket' for a theatre show? 
• What are the impacts of dynamic or personalised pricing on consumers, including vulnerable groups? Can dynamic pricing create a 'poverty premium', creating higher effective prices for consumers on low incomes?  
• How do the pricing strategies that businesses employ interact with other aspects of their platform or service, such as the choices presented to users? 
• How effective is the UK's competition law framework for regulating the pricing practices of businesses?  
• What impact does dynamic pricing have on business value creation and the overall UK economic growth rate? Could tighter regulation negatively affect UK investment and growth rates?