Wrong unit price noticed - wow what a Price per 100kg - but the per piece price is less favourable

ostridge

I always shop by comparing items using the  Unit price pretty much always in small print,  and as there is invariably some discrepencies with different unit prices per 100g, per Kg,  per 100ml, per litre etc. and it's fairly apparent that computer calculation of these prices is not the norm.

With that background,  when I was visiting the Company Shop I noticed that they had a whole section of their chilled foods - the gammon section, wehere all the Unit prices were shown as per 100kg.   I could envisage however that at a Unit price of say £7.55 per 100kg,   they might not be best pleased If I tried to load up a few trolleys at that price;  but the downside the item prices failed to match such generosity.   I decided  it would be a bit unfair to press such advantageous pricing, so I informed the staff of their erroneous maths.

I believe I won't have seen the end of such manual calculation errors,  whilst there is no cross industry Unit price standardisation which would be a necessary precursor to joined-up computerisation.

Don't you think we should have standards set at per gramme or per Kg , but NOT per 100 gramme.  And where is liquid measure to use per ml,  or per litre, but not per 100ml.   The 100g or 100ml I believe are there to confuse the shoppers, by moving the goal posts;  but likewise it leads to staff confusion and give away pricing.

Grey_Critic

We already have a standard - you have said **** I noticed that they had a whole section of their chilled foods - the gammon section, wehere all the Unit prices were shown as per 100kg.  **** It is simple arithmetic

FrugaiMacDugal

Why did you post this in the Techie Stuff forum?

Brie

I would have tried to buy something and see if it came out as noted on the label.

I do agree I wish things were standardised.  I hate trying to do the simple maths of £ per litre or p per 100ml or whatever.  It's even worse when some labels show price per volume and a similar competitor's item with a price per weight.  Olive oil seems to be a common victim of this in some of the shops near me.  And I think I used to really annoy those at the butcher counters in some large shops when they started selling some items per piece.  So they'd have some sausages with a £/kg and others at 35p each.  

fyi - yes I can do a lot of maths in my head but also have a calculator on my phone for the more complicated things.  And yes I know that 1 litre of water = 1 kilo of water but I don't know if the same is true for olive oil or some other items normally sold by volume.  

droopsnoot

I presume the gist of the original post is that £7.55 per 100 *kg* is pretty cheap, and it probably should have said a different unit, though I'm not certain. I very much doubt it's being calculated manually, though, the computer system will have produced the shelf labels. I'm not certain which shop the OP is talking about.

"Don't you think we should have standards set at per gramme or per Kg , but NOT per 100 gramme." - As they're only for comparisons, it doesn't make any difference as long as they're all the same. We're not (well, I'm not) comparing to the wholesale commodity trading price, only the difference between those presented on the shelves.

@Brie the density of the liquid will make a difference to whether the weight is the same as the weight of water - 1l of gearbox oil would weigh more than 1l of petrol because gearbox oil is more dense, similar (to a lesser degree I expect) for water vs olive oil. But you wouldn't be comparing those two things, you'd be comparing one brand of olive oil to another.

What annoys me (and I haven't checked recently, so it might have been rectified) is that things like "club card" prices and "two for one" offers never have the unit prices noted, only the "normal" price.

knightstyle

Even worse is when the same item is priced per unit or per 100gms in different packages.   Bananas are always like this.  12p each or 0,9p per Kg.

RumRat

Not really a technical problem or query is it? Best move it to somewhere they might care...