You’ve probably had this happen with some website, somewhere: the price you see when you start checking out isn’t the price you actually pay. A few extra lines appear — fees, taxes, something vague — and suddenly the total is a lot higher than the number that got you to click “buy” in the first place. Contact lenses aren’t optional for the people who wear them, which is exactly why regulators are paying attention when it happens there.
On October 2, the Federal Trade Commission, joined by Utah and Nevada, sued Lens.com Inc., its owner Cary Samourkachian, and an affiliated company called Speed Commerce LLC, accusing the retailer of advertising one price for contact lenses and then charging a substantially higher price at checkout through hidden fees.
What the lawsuit actually alleges
The complaint says Lens.com advertises contact lenses at one price, then adds “taxes and fees” at checkout that routinely double the price a customer actually pays. That’s not a small service charge or a shipping fee tacked on at the end — the complaint describes a markup large enough to change the real cost of the purchase entirely.
FTC Bureau of Consumer Protection Director Christopher Mufarrige put it directly: “Lens.com advertised one price for contact lenses but charged a substantially higher price at checkout, deceiving consumers about the cost of this healthcare necessity.” That phrase — healthcare necessity — is doing real work here. Contact lenses aren’t a discretionary purchase for the people who depend on them to see.
Why contact lenses specifically triggered this case
You don’t shop around for contact lenses the way you might for a pair of sunglasses. If you wear them, you need them, on a schedule your eye doctor sets, and that need doesn’t disappear if a website’s checkout page suddenly costs more than the ad promised.
Regulators treat deceptive pricing on medical necessities with more weight than they would on, say, a discretionary gadget, precisely because the buyer has less room to simply walk away. If you need your lenses this week, a surprise markup at checkout isn’t really a choice-point — it’s closer to a toll you didn’t know was coming.
Who’s named in the case
The lawsuit names three defendants: Lens.com Inc., the retailer itself; Cary Samourkachian, identified as the company’s owner; and Speed Commerce LLC, described in the complaint as an affiliated entity. Naming an individual owner alongside the corporate entity is a signal that regulators believe responsibility for the alleged pricing scheme reaches beyond the company’s corporate structure alone.
Utah and Nevada joining the FTC’s case means this isn’t a single federal action in isolation — it’s a coordinated effort across two states plus the federal agency, which typically reflects evidence of harm reaching consumers in multiple places, not an isolated billing glitch in one market.
What “hidden fees doubling the price” looks like in practice
Picture ordering a box of lenses advertised at, say, $40. You add it to your cart expecting something close to that number at checkout. The complaint describes a pattern where “taxes and fees” inflate that total substantially — the kind of gap that turns a reasonable-sounding ad into a bill that doesn’t match what you were shown.
This is the mechanism regulators call “drip pricing” — advertising a low headline price, then adding charges incrementally through the purchase flow until the final total is far higher than what drew the customer in. It’s a pattern the FTC has pursued across several industries, and this case applies it specifically to a healthcare-adjacent product most buyers can’t simply skip.
Where this stands right now
It’s important to be precise about what’s actually happened so far: this is a filed complaint, not a verdict or a settlement. The FTC and the two states are alleging the conduct described above; Lens.com, Samourkachian, and Speed Commerce have not been found liable by a court, and the case has not been resolved.
That distinction matters for how you read this story. A filed lawsuit means regulators believed they had enough evidence to bring a case — it doesn’t yet mean a judge or jury has agreed with them.
What this means if you’re a current Lens.com customer
This is reporting, not financial or legal advice — nobody here is telling you what to do with your own contact lens order. What’s worth knowing is simply that a pricing practice you may have noticed yourself — a checkout total that didn’t match the ad — is now the subject of a federal and multi-state legal action, which means it’s documented, not just something you imagined.
If you’ve had a similar experience with a different retailer — an advertised price that grew substantially by the time you reached checkout — it’s worth keeping your order confirmation and the original ad or listing. That kind of documentation is exactly what regulators rely on when building a case like this one.
Why this case may reach beyond one retailer
Drip pricing isn’t unique to contact lenses, and it isn’t unique to Lens.com. The FTC has brought similar cases in other industries over the past several years, and a case built around a healthcare necessity tends to carry extra weight because the harm lands on people who have less flexibility to simply shop elsewhere.
Whatever a court eventually decides here, the case itself is a reminder worth carrying into your own next online purchase: the advertised price is a starting point, not a guarantee, until you’ve actually seen the full total at checkout.
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Womens Overview editors prior to publication.