Pretty Little Thing Class Action Alleges Discount Scheme

A California woman is accusing online retailer Pretty Little Thing of using fake pricing and inflated original prices to make consumers think they are getting a great deal.

Lead plaintiff Haya Hilton claims that Pretty Little Thing regularly advertises items at a 50 percent discount, but consumers who think they are getting an item for half of what it sells for elsewhere are being misled.

“For example, anyone visiting [Pretty Little Thing’s] site on a given day during a ‘GET 50% OFF EVERYTHING SALE’ who buys an item of clothing ‘on sale’ for $20 based on an original or reference price of $40 is being misled,” states the Pretty Little Thing sale class action lawsuit.

“This is deception because that item of clothing has rarely, if ever, been sold in the recent past on the site for $40.”

Hilton claims that she spent more than $100 on the website on various clothing items. She says she made the purchases because she thought she was getting the items on sale, at a 50 percent discount, based on prices labeled as “original” on the website.

However, she later discovered that the items had not been marked down or substantially discounted. In fact, Pretty Little Thing had never sold the items at the so-called original prices listed on the website, says Hilton.

The class action lawsuit further alleges that the Pretty Little Thing sale is not a sale at all because the online retailer’s website is the only place where Pretty Little Thing items are sold and the company cannot claim that the items on their site were sold for higher prices elsewhere.

“It is a scam,” declares the Pretty Little Thing discount class action. “All the reference prices on [Pretty Little Thing’s] website are fake. They are not original, regular, retail, or former prices. They are inflated prices posted to lure unsuspecting customers into jumping at a fake ‘bargain.’”

Calling the Pretty Little Thing discount a scam, the plaintiff says that she wants to put a stop to the practice which has been going on since May 2016.

According to the class action lawsuit, Pretty Little Thing is a website run by Boohoo Group PLC, a company based in the United Kingdom.

Boohoo Group is the parent company of a number of online clothing outlets, including boohoo, boohooMAN, Pretty Little Thing, Nasty Gal, Karen Millen, Coast, and Miss Pap.

“Defendants exclusively sell their clothing and accessories online,” explains the Pretty Little Thing sale class action lawsuit. “Defendants’ marketing emphasizes their bargains and their vast online presence, including millions of followers on social media.”

The Pretty Little Thing discount class action contends that Boohoo Group sells items on the Pretty Little Thing website by relying on deceptive marketing practices.

Discounts of 40, 50, and even 60 percent off are regularly displayed on the main Pretty Little Thing website.

The plaintiff says that these supposed discounts are based on false reference prices or the regular prices of the items.

The false reference prices are reportedly found crossed out beside the supposed sales price on the website browsed by consumers, as well as on the checkout page.

“The only purpose of the Reference Price is to mislead customers into believing that the displayed Reference Price is an original, regular, retail, and/or former price at which [Pretty Little Thing] usually sells the item or previously sold the item in the recent past,” asserts the complaint.

Customers are also hit with a fake sense of urgency by declarations that the false discounts are for a limited time only, alleges the plaintiff.

“Compounding the deception, the [Pretty Little Thing] website will often display messages like ‘Hurry! Limited Time Only’ to give customers a sense of urgency to take advantage of the fake sales, when in reality, [Pretty Little Thing] runs a ‘sale’ on [Pretty Little Thing] items on its site everyday (or at a minimum, most days),” the lawsuit states.

The class action lawsuit seeks to represent a nationwide Class of consumers who purchased falsely discounted Pretty Little Thing items from the company’s website between May 19, 2016 and now, along with a subclass of California residents.

The plaintiff is seeking a court order stopping the alleged false advertising, as well as damages.

Do you think the Pretty Little Thing discount is deceptive? Did you buy something from a Pretty Little Thing sale? Let us know in the comments section below!

The lead plaintiff and proposed Class Members are represented by Yasin M. Almadani of Almadani Law and Ahmed Ibrahim of AI Law, PLC.

The Pretty Little Thing Sale Class Action Lawsuit is Haya Hilton v. Prettylittlething.com USA Inc., et al., Case No. 2:20-cv-04658, in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.

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