Instacart customers may be surprised to discover they are unwittingly paying more for the same items sold by some of America's major retail chains than their fellow shoppers.

A months-long investigation by the nonprofit organizations Consumer Reports and Groundwork Collaborative found that identical grocery items on Instacart could differ in price by as much as 23% from one customer to the next.

That's due to the platform's algorithmic pricing experiments, which place different price tags on identical products without revealing the discrepancies directly to shoppers, the report found. The AI model, which Instacart started implementing in 2022, sets grocery prices at some large retail chains that partner with the San Francisco-based delivery company, the groups added.

Variations in pri

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