Taking Out The Trash: New Junk Fee Laws Impact Pricing Practices

The Bottom Line

• The federal government and state lawmakers are heavily focused on junk fee practices. Businesses should stay apprised of the fluid legislative and regulatory landscape.
• Audit all pricing and checkout practices – "surcharges," "service fees" and the like will need to start being included in the total advertised price of an item.
• Carefully consider whether shipping costs and taxes represent the reasonable and actually incurred postage or carrier costs, and government-mandated fees.

We are about to see an enormous uptick in federal and state regulation of "junk fees" – and the class action bar is undoubtedly preparing to act.

With federal rulemaking on unfair and deceptive fees set to go into effect later this year and new state legislation being passed almost every week (with California's law taking effect July 1, 2024), companies will need to pay attention to these evolving and ever more stringent rules. While the web of laws on this