ACCC Signals Tough Year Ahead for Retail, Digital Platforms & Essential Services

Key Takeaways

• Cost-of-Living Sectors in the Crosshairs: Supermarkets, retail supply chains, energy, telecommunications, and aviation will face sustained scrutiny over market power, pricing transparency, and conduct that limits competition.
• Digital Market Design and Platform Power Under Pressure: The ACCC will target subscription traps, dark patterns, unsafe goods sold online, data access restrictions, and continue advocating for a new digital competition regime.
• Greenwashing and Environmental Claims a Major Enforcement Focus: Misleading sustainability representations will remain a priority, building on recent court actions involving renewable gas, “reef friendly,” and recycled material claims.
• Unfair Contract Terms and Consumer Guarantees Targeted: Automatic renewals, early termination fees, non-cancellation clauses, and motor vehicle consumer guarantee compliance are priority enforcement areas.
• Cartels, Market Power Abuse, and Serious Consumer Harm Remain Core Priorities: Ongoing cartel cases, misuse of market power litigation, and high-penalty enforcement actions reinforce the ACCC’s continued focus on systemic competition risks and vulnerable consumers.

Deep Dive

At a time when households are still feeling the strain of rising costs and businesses are navigating rapid technological change, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has set out a compliance and enforcement agenda designed to steady the ground beneath both.

Delivering a keynote address in Sydney, ACCC Chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb used the launch of the regulator’s 2026–27 priorities to make a broader point. Competition and consumer trust, she argued, are not abstract regulatory goals. They are the operating conditions of a healthy economy.

Citing the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s 2026 Economic Survey of Australia, she noted that productivity is materially higher in countries with strong competition settings. But she was equally direct in warning that competition alone is insufficient. If consumers cannot trust pricing, marketing or product safety, markets do not function as intended.

The ACCC’s 2026–27 priorities reflect that framing.

Cartels, Market Power and Serious Harm

Some areas, Cass-Gottlieb made clear, will always command the regulator’s attention.

Cartel conduct, collusion, anti-competitive agreements and misuse of market power remain enduring priorities. The ACCC currently has four cartel cases before the courts involving sectors ranging from mobile crane hire and fresh produce to facility management services. A misuse of market power case against Mastercard is scheduled to go to trial next month.

On the consumer side, the regulator will continue to pursue conduct that places individuals at serious risk, particularly vulnerable consumers and First Nations Australians.

Cass-Gottlieb pointed to last year’s Federal Court decision ordering Optus to pay a $100 million penalty for unconscionable conduct in selling mobile phones and contracts to vulnerable consumers who could not afford or use them. More than 400 people were affected, including many in regional and remote communities. The Court described the consequences as “profound.”

The message, she said, is that large corporations must have systems and incentives that prevent exploitation, not simply remedy it after the fact.

Supermarkets and Retail in the Spotlight

Cost-of-living pressures were a recurring theme throughout the address, and nowhere more so than in supermarkets and retail.

Over the past year, the ACCC initiated civil cartel proceedings against four fresh food suppliers and three senior executives for alleged price fixing in the supply of fruit and vegetables to ALDI stores across multiple states.

It has also taken action in resale price maintenance matters, accepting court-enforceable undertakings from suppliers accused of attempting to control the prices at which retailers could sell products.

Meanwhile, proceedings against Woolworths and Coles over alleged misleading discount pricing claims continue in the Federal Court. The ACCC has conducted sweeps of major sales events such as Black Friday and Boxing Day, examining “site-wide” and “up to” discount claims that may apply to only a narrow range of products.

For 2026–27, the regulator will maintain its focus on firms with market power, restrictions that limit price competition and misleading pricing practices that undermine consumer trust.

Essential Services and Aviation

Telecommunications, electricity and gas remain firmly on the agenda.

These sectors are essential to economic participation and household wellbeing, yet are often concentrated and characterized by complex pricing structures. Cass-Gottlieb said the ACCC will continue promoting competition and addressing misleading pricing and claims, particularly in energy and telecommunications.

Aviation is also under sustained scrutiny. With high barriers to entry and limited consumer choice, especially in regional areas, the sector presents ongoing competition and consumer concerns. The ACCC will continue monitoring the market, advocating for better outcomes and taking enforcement action where appropriate.

Digital Markets and Data Power

Digital and data-enabled markets feature prominently in the 2026–27 priorities.

The ACCC will target manipulative and false practices in digital markets, including subscription traps and other “dark patterns” that distort consumer choice. Unsafe consumer goods facilitated by digital platforms are also in scope.

Recent enforcement actions illustrate the regulator’s approach. In 2025, Google admitted breaching Australia’s competition law in relation to the distribution of its search services on Android devices and agreed to jointly submit a $55 million penalty to the Court, which was subsequently ordered. The matter also included a court-enforceable undertaking requiring changes to how Google distributes Search in Australia.

In another case, an ACCC investigation into Equifax’s exclusivity arrangements led to the company ceasing reliance on provisions that risked restricting entry and hindering competition in markets reliant on payroll and superannuation data. The regulator also secured a court-enforceable undertaking preventing similar future agreements.

The ACCC will also continue enforcing obligations under the Consumer Data Right framework and engaging with government on a proposed digital competition regime based on service-specific codes for platforms with entrenched market power.

Overlaying this is the Scams Prevention Framework, introduced in 2025, which establishes coordinated obligations across designated sectors to prevent, detect and respond to scams and to share intelligence with the ACCC.

Greenwashing, Contracts and Product Safety

Environmental claims remain a key enforcement focus as sustainability messaging increases across sectors.

Over the past year, the ACCC commenced proceedings against Edgewell over “reef friendly” sunscreen claims and against Australian Gas Networks for advertising that household gas would become renewable within a generation without reasonable grounds. The Federal Court also imposed penalties of $8.25 million against Clorox Australia for falsely representing certain products as made from “ocean plastic.”

In 2026–27, greenwashing will continue to attract scrutiny alongside unfair contract terms, particularly automatic renewals, early termination fees and non-cancellation clauses. The ACCC will also focus on improving compliance with consumer guarantees in relation to motor vehicles.

Product safety remains a standing concern. The regulator will continue prioritizing button battery, infant sleep and toppling furniture standards. Last year, the Federal Court imposed a $14 million penalty on City Beach for supplying products that failed to comply with mandatory button battery safety requirements.

A New Merger Era

Cass-Gottlieb also highlighted Australia’s new administrative merger regime, which came fully into effect on 1 January 2026.

Since 1 July 2025, the ACCC has received 31 merger notifications, approving 15 and assessing 16, including two that have moved to Phase 2 review. Since the beginning of 2026, 23 notification waivers have been approved and three denied. The regulator said it has met its target of determining around 80 per cent of waiver and notification applications within 20 business days.

The regime is designed, Cass-Gottlieb said, to deal quickly with transactions that do not raise competition concerns while subjecting more complex acquisitions to structured scrutiny.

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