ASA Adjudication on Royal Air Force

Ad

Two radio ads promoting careers within the Royal Air Force (RAF) in conjunction with Kiss 100 FM (Kiss).

a. The voice-over in the first ad said "Kiss tries out for Royal Air Force Careers. The least nine-to-five by far. Hollyoaks' Max and O.B. find out". The ad then featured the characters 'Max' and 'O.B.' from Hollyoaks who said "Hi it's Matt Littler and Darren Jeffries from Hollyoaks and we're at RAF Coningsby with Kiss. Day one: we arrived and we were kitted out, we got all the uniforms sorted ... and then we went and did a little bit of first aid training, then we did basic weapons training, then we were shooting in the range, then we did the low ropes and ... team building, then we drilled on the drill yard and did all the marching. Day two was ... office-based ... sorting out deployment welfare packages ... getting someone home whose son was sick ... it's been massively varied." The voice-over said "Royal Air Force Careers. The least nine-to-five by far. For more check out totalkiss.com."

b. The second ad featured the same introductory voice-over as ad (a) and again featured 'Max' and 'O.B.'. They said "Hi it's Matt Littler and Darren Jeffries from Hollyoaks and we're at RAF Coningsby with Kiss. The role that me and Matt have been ... filling has been the role of the personal administrator in the RAF. If you've got a job where you deal with administration, then this is the ... coolest administration job there is because, rather than organising a meeting or some kind of office outing ... you're organising chinook helicopters landing in Basra so it's kind of exciting." The voice-over said "Royal Air Force Careers. The least nine-to-five by far. For more check out totalkiss.com."

Issue

One listener challenged whether the ads made sufficiently clear that they were advertising material.  He believed listeners could confuse them with editorial content.

BCAP Radio Code

Response

RAF and Kiss submitted a combined response.  They explained that the content of the ads related to a joint promotion between RAF and Kiss to promote careers in the RAF and had featured actors from the popular TV programme "Hollyoaks" and not Kiss presenters.  They had thought that distinction was clear but acknowledged it could have been clearer.  They confirmed that the ads had been broadcast in clearly identifiable ad breaks and provided digital copies of two ad breaks in which ad (b) had been scheduled, including several minutes of the broadcast output either side of the ad break, to support this.  They told the ASA that they had no plans to repeat the ads in future.

Assessment

Not upheld

The ASA considered it was clear that the ads were being voiced by "Hollyoaks" actors and not Kiss presenters.  We understood the complainant was aware of this but had been concerned that listeners might have interpreted the ad as editorial content because of the references to Kiss; "Kiss tries out for Royal Air Force Careers", "we're at RAF Conningsby with Kiss" and "For more check out totalkiss.com".

We noted the ads were scheduled within clearly identifiable ad breaks and that the evidence submitted supported this.  We concluded that, because of the careful scheduling, listeners would be aware they were listening to advertising material and were unlikely to confuse the content of the ads with editorial content.

We investigated ads (a) and (b) under CAP (Broadcast) Radio Advertising Standards Code section 2 rule 1 (Transparency and clear separation of advertising) but did not find them breach.

Action

No further action necessary.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Broadcast)