Alibaba had turned “Singles’ Day”, a November 11 Chinese response to Valentine’s Day, into an online shopping festival in 2009 and the event had grown to similar proportions as Cyber Monday and Black Friday in the US, iamwire.com reports.
The shopping frenzy led to massive discounts which in turn resulted in a no-profit or loss making situations for sellers. The company was also fined CNY 500,000 (USD 81,000) for Singles’ Day pricing by third-party sellers on the Tmall marketplace in 2013 and 2014 and USD 48,000 for pricing in other promotions in 2013 and 2015.
While pricing is handled by third parties, not directly by Alibaba, the group said that it would nevertheless, reinforce pricing rules and regulations with sellers to protect consumers.
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