Australians could feel a pinch at the checkout as the falling dollar drives up the cost of importing goods such as electronics, clothes and cars, economists say.
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The Australian dollar hit US75.09c on Saturday, its lowest level since May 2009, on the back of weak consumer spending and falling iron ore prices.
While the Reserve Bank has been calling for a lower dollar to stimulate growth, economists say consumers could bear the brunt if higher import costs are recovered through higher retail prices.
"A whole raft of imported goods has the potential to be higher, from electrical items to cars," Commsec chief economist Craig James said.
"The question is whether the retailers decide to pass it on. It will depend on good to good; it depends on what [profit] margins are doing at the moment; it just depends what scope a business has to cut costs."
Tarken Ceviker, from HiTek Audio and Video, said his store had already seen the effects of a lower Australian dollar, which has been on a steady tumble since hitting parity with the US in 2011.
He said suppliers to the Northcote store jacked up wholesale and recommended retail prices on imported gear by 15 to 20 per in January, driving some customers away.
"We'd get people coming in in October last year and we'd quote them pricing and then they'd come in six months later when their house is ready to be fitted out, and naturally, all the pricing has gone up," Mr Ceviker said.
"Now they're looking at 15 to 20 per cent more outlay than what they had planned.
"A number of times we've had people say: 'oh, we might just have to think it out again because we didn't think it was going to be this much'."
While mid-range goods from big retailers only had a shelf life of about 12 months before being superseded by new and more expensive models, Mr Ceviker said the high-end products he sold were often on the market for six to seven years, making them a good barometer of how the dollar affected consumer prices.
"Every time there's an improvement in the Aussie dollar, the price drops, anytime the Aussie dollar drops, the price goes up."
Commsec's Mr James said that while there had not generally been a noticeable increase in retail prices, businesses had been enjoying low transports costs because of low crude oil prices.
He said oil was now about $US60 a barrel, compared to $US40 earlier in the year, creating a "double whammy" for retailers.
"As we move into the second half of the year, a lower Australian dollar combined with higher petrol prices has the potential to put upward pressure on the price of imported goods," Mr James said.
In good news for local retailers, Felicity Emmett, co-head of Australian economics at ANZ, said the weaker Australian dollar had driven people away from shopping with international online outlets and back to local stores.
"We're not seeing the same sort of international online spend that we were seeing at the time when the dollar was closer to parity... so some of that is now being redirected into Australian sales," Ms Emmett said.
She predicted the dollar would continue to slide, finishing the year at US73c and dropping further to US70c in 2016.
