Dynamic pricing
Dynamic pricing has been around for a long time. Airlines, hotels and ride-sharing have always adjusted prices based on supply and demand.
Over the past two weeks, there have been news reports of Uber increasing fares across Australia, including new fuel surcharges layered into trips.
On the surface, this looks like a response to rising costs. But underneath, it points to something bigger. Pricing is no longer being adjusted periodically.
What’s changed is how far this can now go. Pricing is no longer set at a product or route level. It’s becoming situational, responsive to context in real time.
How Amazon operationalises this: Amazon has taken this further than most. Prices on millions of products shift constantly based on:
- competitor pricing
- inventory levels
- browsing behaviour
- demand patterns
AI-optimised pricing
AI models process these signals and make micro-adjustments at scale. Not weekly. Not daily. Continuously. Importantly, this isn’t sitting in a dashboard. It’s embedded directly into the buying journey.
With AI-optimised pricing, the question becomes: “What should we charge this customer, right now, given everything we know about the situation?”
In the short term, it works. You get relevant offers. Businesses improve conversion and margin. The system feels efficient. But over time, something shifts.
When prices move in ways that aren’t easily understood, customers stop taking them at face value. The question changes from “Is this worth it?” to “Why am I being charged this?”
What’s really going on
Customers are learning that pricing is fluid, and they’re adjusting their behaviour accordingly.
The risk isn’t immediate backlash. It’s more subtle than that. It’s the slow erosion of confidence in the price itself.
When that happens, decision-making changes. It becomes slower, more considered, more comparative. This is a breakdown in trust signals and a customer experience problem in the making.
How customers are working around it
Customers are learning how pricing systems work, and then actively working around them:
- resetting the algorithm (clearing cookies, using incognito mode)
- location spoofing (using VPNs to change location)
- time-based gaming (tracking and waiting for price changes)
- multi-platform comparison at speed (checking multiple apps simultaneously)
- sharing pricing “hacks” across TikTok, Reddit and YouTube
Impact on customer experience
The unintended consequence is that dynamic pricing will train customers to be:
- less loyal — always checking alternatives, with no assumption of fairness
- more tactical — delaying purchases and gaming timing
- more sceptical — questioning every price and assuming manipulation
Dynamic pricing is a powerful commercial lever. It allows organisations to respond to demand with a level of precision that wasn’t possible before.
But it also changes the customer relationship. The more precisely pricing is optimised, the more visible the system becomes. And once customers start to see the system, they don’t just accept it.
They start to work around it.