Maryland's Protection From Predatory Pricing Act took effect October 1. Chapter 154 restricts covered food retailers and third-party food-delivery providers from using dynamic pricing or personal data to set specified higher prices for tax-exempt food for a particular consumer or group. It does not ban every grocery-price increase.
Exceptions include promotions, voluntary loyalty programs, subscriptions, consent-based offers, shipping and tax differences, location-based costs, supply differences and price-error corrections. Two different checkout prices do not alone prove a violation.
A separate provision requires covered merchants communicating prices set through dynamic pricing or personal data to disclose: "This price was set by an algorithm or by using your personal data". It has its own exclusions, including specified financial and insurance activity and food businesses already governed by the food-pricing section.
The Consumer Protection Division must provide notice and a forty-five-day cure period before an enforcement action under these provisions. They do not create a private lawsuit right. Preserve the actual offer, product, time and account conditions when questioning a markup. The new disclosure does not fix prices statewide or outlaw ordinary loyalty discounts.