News Amcor Settles One Case

[AlecDuncan]

It may be that Visy has quietly settled with any disgruntled customers to avoid publicity, but so far only Amcor has had to fight customers in the civil courts for damages due to price-fixing. Visy is a private company, so it's possible we'll never know if they did. However, you'd still think we'd find out via publicly owned customers involved in any claims.

On its face, only Amcor has as good as publicly admitted it directly ripped customers off, having just settled with Cadbury.

The claimed damages amount of $235.8M was probably pulled from the same dark orifice that ASIC uses for estimates - I doubt Amcor settled for anything like that. The usual idiots will always be tempted to apply the Pilger Curve to any numbers.

 

[Bluebear]

It may be that Visy has quietly settled with any disgruntled customers to avoid publicity, but so far only Amcor has had to fight customers in the civil courts for damages due to price-fixing. Visy is a private company, so it's possible we'll never know if they did. However, you'd still think we'd find out via publicly owned customers involved in any claims.

On its face, only Amcor has as good as publicly admitted it directly ripped customers off, having just settled with Cadbury.

The claimed damages amount of $235.8M was probably pulled from the same dark orifice that ASIC uses for estimates - I doubt Amcor settled for anything like that. The usual idiots will always be tempted to apply the Pilger Curve to any numbers.

The way I understand it, the public had money "taken from their pockets" because companies like Cadbury had to pass on the increased prices to US.

If Cadbury don't send this back to the customers via some cashback or price reduction........aren't they just as "guilty" of ripping us off as AMCOR and VISY?

I'm sure the level of outrage on talkback radio and in the media against Cadbury will reach similar levels to that of VISY and Pratt.

 

[AlecDuncan]

If Cadbury don't send this back to the customers via some cashback or price reduction........aren't they just as "guilty" of ripping us off as AMCOR and VISY?

Thay're already ripping us off. Have you noticed the "family blocks" have shrunk like cheap cotton and they've changed the recipe for their chocolate to use vegetable oil instead of dairy fat? They're pissing on their brand and hoping the public doesn't notice.

 

[Bluebear]

Thay're already ripping us off. Have you noticed the "family blocks" have shrunk like cheap cotton and they've changed the recipe for their chocolate to use vegetable oil instead of dairy fat? They're pissing on their brand and hoping the public doesn't notice.

Yeah.....spotted that........all will be forgiven when they send me my cheque for past injustices they were forced to pass on.

 

[Sublime]

It may be that Visy has quietly settled with any disgruntled customers to avoid publicity, but so far only Amcor has had to fight customers in the civil courts for damages due to price-fixing. Visy is a private company, so it's possible we'll never know if they did. However, you'd still think we'd find out via publicly owned customers involved in any claims.

On its face, only Amcor has as good as publicly admitted it directly ripped customers off, having just settled with Cadbury.

The claimed damages amount of $235.8M was probably pulled from the same dark orifice that ASIC uses for estimates - I doubt Amcor settled for anything like that. The usual idiots will always be tempted to apply the Pilger Curve to any numbers.

I'm just here highlighting the words that i enjoyed the most. Nothing to see here.

 

[AlecDuncan]

Amcor, Visy to pay $95m in settlement.

That looks like the last of it. Again, it looks like they were sued for enabling Amcor to rip their customers off, rather than ripping customers off directly for their own benefit.

Visy's damage bill: $31.7M. I wouldn't want to pay it, but it's a long way from what ACCC claimed.

 

[The Toad]

The ACCC are a ****ing joke. They pick and choose who they will go after, all the while letting the bloody petrol companies off scott free while they are ripping us off blind and the ACCC do sweet **** all.

The whole stinking mess should be dismantled and just blow away.

 

[Aphrodite]

The ACCC are a ****ing joke. They pick and choose who they will go after, all the while letting the bloody petrol companies off scott free while they are ripping us off blind and the ACCC do sweet **** all.

The whole stinking mess should be dismantled and just blow away.

Graeme Samuel .......... Enough said

 

[agro]

Funny how Graeme Samuel never went after his mate Ron Evans who made his fortune ripping off football patrons for years overcharging for cold pies, warm beer, soggy chips.

Ron Evan's Spotless Catering never price gouged or ripped off the football public did it Graeme.

 

[Bell Ringer]

Thay're already ripping us off. Have you noticed the "family blocks" have shrunk like cheap cotton and they've changed the recipe for their chocolate to use vegetable oil instead of dairy fat? They're pissing on their brand and hoping the public doesn't notice.

Hershey's in the US have recently done something similar; swapped the cocoa butter for vegetable oil to lower costs. However, they can't advertise as "MILK chocolate", just "chocolate". Not a big difference but do you know if Cadburys have had to change their labels?

At least you can get Coke with sugar in Australia.

 

[Canyouhearthedrums]

In the end, the case has been settled because Visy and Amcor knew they would likely lose if the civil proceedings were determined at trial.

 

[MightyBlue]

The ACCC are a ****ing joke. They pick and choose who they will go after, all the while letting the bloody petrol companies off scott free while they are ripping us off blind and the ACCC do sweet **** all.

The whole stinking mess should be dismantled and just blow away.

Hate to break it to you Toad, but oil companies make about 2 cents per litre on fuel. They've been investigated by the ACCC more than any other industry (due to public pressure) and no charges have ever been laid.

If you want to complain about someone, look at software companies making 40% profit on everything they sell.

 

[thylacine60]

Like people still pay for software.

 

[AlecDuncan]

In the end, the case has been settled because Visy and Amcor knew they would likely lose if the civil proceedings were determined at trial.

I don't think there was ever any risk of Visy and Amcor winning this case, and I doubt they even wanted to - these are customers after all. This was all about coming to a credible damages figure, as opposed to pulling a random big round number from Graham Samuel's arse.

 

[Dramoth]

Like people still pay for software.

they do??? damn

 

[KnaveyBlue]

The way I understand it, the public had money "taken from their pockets" because companies like Cadbury had to pass on the increased prices to US.

If Cadbury don't send this back to the customers via some cashback or price reduction........aren't they just as "guilty" of ripping us off as AMCOR and VISY?

This. 100 times.

I'm amazed at how short sighted people are. The brainless masses are sated with the blood of Visy and Amcor, meanwhile the big corporations like Cadbury pocket the money.

The average man on the street doesn't get his money back - Cadbury gets it. But he's happy because he's been told that the bad guys have been caught.

Amcor and Visy didn't rip off the average Australian - they fleeced the big corporations.
The rip-off of the common man will come when companies like Cadbury get their huge payout, and pass none of it back to the consumer they originally charged.

 

[Monkey King]

Visy's damage bill: $31.7M. I wouldn't want to pay it, but it's a long way from what ACCC claimed.

Actually the ACCC nor Justice Heerey in his judgement ever made any direct claim of loss suffered by the public. The only spoke of "potential" non-specified costs of $300m; and they did so carefully, because no one could prove if costs were ever passed to indirect purchasers. As it turns out, most of that figure belonged to the unprosecuted company, who ironically were known by the ACCC to have engaged in other cartel behaviour.

Of course, in the class action case for $700m, Federal Judges made it clear that how costs were passed along the consumer chain was going to be a key issue affecting determination. I don't think any of those companies wanted this to be investigated less the truth be revealed that they pocketed all the price-war reductions of earlier years.

Ultimately, there was never any actual loss. It's all associated with further anticipated reductions from a hyper-competitive market that was never guaranteed to continue anyway.

 

[The Old Dark Navy's]

Well well well, so far Visy has been found to have (assisted Amcor) ripped off every man, woman, and child in Australia to the tune of about $1.40 each spread over 4 years.

How much has is Amcor paying out including Cadbury? How the hell did they get the immunity?

Seems that most companies affected by this cartel failed to pass on savings to the consumer in the first place, then failed to pass on the costs that supposedly made this the worse price fixing cartel in Australian history.

What a sham.

 

[sosos]

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/bus...r-secret-meeting/story-e6frg8zx-1226024317348

Rather than arbitrating the field, Samuel's been playing it.

 

[The Old Dark Navy's]

Deceitful snake furthering his own interests. Does anybody have any doubt that he was capable of being less than honourable in the way he chased down Visy and Pratt while exonerating Amcor?

 

[Dramoth]

If I was part of an honest government, I would be setting up an enquiry into Samuals and tracking the accounting of all cases that he has headed over the past 10 years and I would be looking for anything potentially damaging towards him...

But we all know that governments these days are run by big business and capitalism and the little people can all go get ****ed!

 

[Silvagnis]

Beer wars: big retail v Foster's

Beer has become the new battleground in the supermarket price war after Australia's biggest brewer, Foster's, pulled key beer brands from Coles and Woolworths upon learning of a plan to sell them for $28 a slab - well below cost.

A slab of 24 VB stubbies usually wholesales to the big supermarket chains for about $33 and retails for $38. Smaller retailers say they are being charged between $37 and $41 - with some even higher - for the same slab.

Coles and Woolworths, which control 50 per cent of Australia's liquor distribution, have never before been taken on in this way by a supplier.

Beer wars: big retail v Foster's

Wait until the ACCC hears of this...



I guess Graeme Samuel isn't a beer drinker...

 

[sosos]

Perhaps Australia can look now forward to an unconflicted ACCC chairman.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/bus...accc-chief-email/story-fn4xq4zx-1226033935975
COMPETITION tsar Graeme Samuel sent an email to all his staff today advising that he intended to pursue "other interests" when his present term expired on July 31.
The email from the chairman of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission follows continued speculation that he may be seeking a new term.
But taken at its word, the email rules out a new term.
The email to staff Mr Samuel said it had always "been my wish and intent to pursue other interests" when his term expired.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/bus...accc-chief-email/story-fn4xq4zx-1226033935975

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/bus...t-new-accc-chief/story-e6frg9io-1226034006499
Personal conflicts don’t sit neatly with high profile public positions, particularly involving a regulator.
The fact is eight years is long enough in any high profile job and Samuel acknowledged that at the start of his second term by privately signalling at age 60 he would ready for another challenge.
The question is just what job he will take and more to the point who will take his place.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/bus...t-new-accc-chief/story-e6frg9io-1226034006499


It was 8 years too long Graeme. And there may be no jobs.

 

[agro]

Never had a go at his mate Ron Evans either who through his company Spotless Catering has ripped football fans off for years with overpriced warm beer and cold pies at the football.

 

[blue healer]

Hate to break it to you Toad, but oil companies make about 2 cents per litre on fuel. They've been investigated by the ACCC more than any other industry (due to public pressure) and no charges have ever been laid.

If you want to complain about someone, look at software companies making 40% profit on everything they sell.

Not sure where you get those numbers from but think you'll find it's the servos that get 2cpl. If that's all the petrol companies get then I'm selling my shares.