ASA Adjudication on Arriva the Shires Ltd

Ad

A regional press insert, for Arriva bus services, stated "Improved Links Across Your Region ... Improved services linking Milton Keynes, Aylesbury, Leighton Buzzard and Luton Airport". The insert featured five bus routes and showed each main stop on the line; text continued "Our improved network now offers: Line 100 - express service between Aylesbury and Milton Keynes; Aylesbury, Bierton, Wing - service frequency doubled; New Link to London Luton Airport ...".

Issue

The complainant challenged whether the claims "Improved Links" and "Improved services" were misleading, because he believed Arriva had reduced the frequency of services between Leighton Buzzard and Milton Keynes.

CAP Code (Edition 11)

Response

Arriva the Shires (Arriva) said they had introduced changes to some of their bus services on 3 September. They explained that the X15 route that ran between Aylesbury and Milton Keynes, via Leighton Buzzard, had been replaced by two new services that were featured on the insert in question.

Arriva said, prior to the service changes, there were 173 departures per week on the X15 route. They explained that the replacement services - the number 70 and number 150 - offered 245 departures per week. Arriva calculated that this constituted a 40% increase on the number of departures offered per week by the X15 service. They therefore believed the claims "Improved Links" and "Improved services" were justified.

Assessment

Not upheld

The ASA noted Arriva's comments. We understood that the X15 route that operated between Aylesbury and Milton Keynes, via Leighton Buzzard, had been replaced by two services and that the number 150 service took the same route. We noted the number 70 service operated between Luton Airport and Milton Keynes, via Leighton Buzzard, but took a different route to the X15 between Leighton Buzzard and Milton Keynes. We understood that the departure and arrival points in Milton Keynes and Leighton Buzzard were the same on the X15, 70 and 150 routes.

While we noted there had been a reduction in the number of departures per week from the 173 offered on the X15 route to 69 on the 150 route, we considered that, overall, the number of services offered by the 70 and 150 between Leighton Buzzard and Milton Keynes had increased. We noted the insert claimed "Improved Links Across Your Region" and "Improved services" and considered that the claims referred to bus services in general, not the X15 bus route. Because we understood that the number of services between Leighton Buzzard and Milton Keynes had increased overall and because the number 70 route covered an area not previously served by the X15 route, we concluded that the claims were acceptable.

We investigated the insert under CAP Code clauses 3.1 (Substantiation) and 7.1 (Truthfulness) but did not find it in breach.

Action

No further action necessary.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)