Tourists keen on snaring bargain fake designer goods might be better off paying for the real thing after an Austrian tourist was fined €1000 ($1450) for trying to buy a fake Louis Vuitton handbag.

Austrian pensioner Ursula Corel, 65, tried to pay a measly €7 for the handbag in the Italian resort of Jesolo, near Venice.

The Guardian newspaper reported that Corel was spotted by the authorities as they scanned crowds with high powered binoculars from a lifeguard's watch tower and was then slapped with the fine.

Authorities say they are enforcing a summer crackdown on counterfeit goods, which are worth more than $12 billion globally every year.

But Corel was less than impressed.