An investigation into US computer giant Dell has been launched by Taiwan, over online pricing errors which could be in violation of the island's fair trade law.

An official said on Tuesday that the investigation is being carried by the Fair Trade Commission, with the aim of finding out whether Dell is liable of "false or misleading pricing" of its products, punishable up to a fine of between 50,000 to 25 million Taiwan dollars (1,500 to 760,000 US dollars).

The official clarified that it would take about two to three months for the investigation to get over.
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It should be noted that after products appeared to be drastically under-priced twice in just ten days, the online shoppers in Taiwan started criticizing Dell. 

Since then, the company shut down its Taiwanese online shopping site, after being alerted about the error.

The customers who placed orders would be charged the correct price by the company. However, a voucher of 20,000 Taiwan dollars has also been offered by the company for use as a discount against each purchase in compensation for the error.

It should be noted though that Dell has been accused of hurting customers' interests, by a local consumer rights group, which threatened to sue the company or call for a boycott of its products.
 
The Consumers' Foundation said: "Dell's (online) system has malfunctioned twice but it is acting irresponsibly by ignoring the welfare of consumers." It added that other companies had honored contracts following similar errors.

Via a statement, the Foundation said: "We urge Dell to come up with a reasonable compensation package or ship the products according to the (cheaper) contracts."