The FTC’s public comment window on its proposed personalized-pricing enforcement policy closes September 25, six days out. The comment-window extension granted on September 3 pushed the original September 18 deadline by seven days. Docket FTC-2026-1057 has been open for 37 days total.

The proposed statement, released August 19 on a 2-0 vote, defines personalized pricing as using personal data to set prices according to what a company believes an individual will pay. Chairman Andrew Ferguson framed the enforcement posture bluntly: businesses that “fail to tell consumers how their personal data is being used to set a price may be in violation of the FTC Act.”

Scope matters, and it’s narrower than the headlines suggest. Sidley reads the draft to exclude dynamic pricing tied to supply, demand, or local market conditions, along with risk-based pricing in insurance and credit. What triggers Section 5 exposure, per Sheppard Mullin, is a price set from inferences about one consumer, a “special price” that’s actually higher because of inferred willingness to pay. Morgan Lewis and Sidley read the draft to require disclosure that the price is personalized, the basis for personalization, and the data types used. Named example sectors include retail, food delivery, hotels, rideshare, and home security.

For owner/founders, the structural question is who sets the price of record. Silent algorithmic variation at checkout is the exposed pattern. Human-approved outreach isn’t. LemonLime prepares personalized outreach and offers for owner review; the customer triggers every send, keeping the business, not an algorithm, as the price-setter of record.

Morgan Lewis expects state enforcers and courts to treat a final statement as indicative of what counts as unfair or deceptive. That’s the real stakes of the initial small-business notice, and it’s the same post-comment gravity now shaping the AI accuracy rule in post-comment limbo. Six days.

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