ASA Adjudication on Telefonica O2 UK Ltd

Ad

Two national press ads.

a. One ad was headlined "9/10 customers would recommend O2 Home Broadband." and stated "Free 24/7 UK based customer service … Up to 20 meg, depending on location … Prices from just £7.50 a month*". The footnote stated "… Speed varies depending on factors including distance from exchange and network coverage".

b. The second ad was headlined "Home broadband with free 24/7 UK customer service" and stated "Up to 20 meg, depending on location … Unlimited downloads … Prices from just £7.50 a month*". The footnote stated "…Speed varies depending on factors including distance from exchange and network coverage".

Issue

Virgin Media, who noted only 5% of UK users of services with ADSL2+ technology could attain the headline speed, challenged whether the ads exaggerated the availability and benefits likely to be obtained by customers who signed up to the 20 meg broadband service.

CAP Code (Edition 11)

Response

Telefonica O2 UK Ltd (O2) said, when preparing the ad, they had followed previous ASA adjudications and CAP guidance, which required ads for high speed broadband services to state that top speeds varied significantly, in particular because of a user's distance from the local exchange.  They pointed out that the ads not only pre-fixed the claim "20 Meg" with "up to", in accordance with the established industry norm for advertising speeds, but also included an explicit, body-copy reference to the speed being "dependent on location". They also pointed out that the small print stated "speed varies depending on factors including distance from the exchange and network coverage".  O2 added that the ad featured a link to their website which contained a significant body of information on their services.

O2 said the usage of high-speed broadband had changed since the ASA's last adjudication on the advertising of ADSL2+ broadband services. They referred to the increased prevalence of more bandwidth intensive activities, such as file sharing and video streaming.  O2 sent a detailed breakdown of line tests conducted on each of their Ultimate Package customers i.e. those subscribed to their ADSL2+ service advertised at "up to 20 meg". O2 said the data sent demonstrated that a significant proportion of their customers were able to achieve speeds of near or over 20 Mbps. They pointed out that they advertised their service at 20 Mbps only, even though a small number of customers achieved up to the ADSL2+ top speed of 24 Mbps.

O2 said they did not dispute the complainants' assertion that a comparatively small number of the total population could obtain ADSL2+ speeds of 20 Mbps or more. They maintained, however, that a national average was not particularly relevant to the main substance of the complaint. They said they had acknowledged the difficulties related to signal attenuation due to line length and actively ensured that only consumers up to 1.25 km from their telephone exchange were offered the Ultimate Package. They added that it was also their policy to contact new Ultimate Package customers after a set period to advise them to downgrade their package if they were not found to be achieving speeds of around 16 Mbps.  O2 believed they had taken reasonable and responsible steps to ensure that consumers received the appropriate package based on the capacity of their telephone line.

O2 said they had signed up to Ofcom's voluntary Code of Practice for Broadband Speeds. They said they accorded with the principles of the Code of Practice, such as checking all customers' lines at sign up to ensure that they were being offered the appropriate package. They added that O2 Home Broadband had recently been awarded fastest broadband provider in separate public speed tests, carried out by two internet comparison websites.

Assessment

Not upheld

The ASA noted the ads were for "O2 Home Broadband" and, although they referred to the fastest available O2 service at "up to 20 meg", they did not focus specifically on that package.  We noted the price quoted was the starting price for O2's home broadband packages, specifically their Standard 8 Mbps service.  We considered that readers were likely to understand the ads as being for the range of O2's services in general rather than being specifically for the 20 Mbps Ultimate Package.

We understood that signal attenuation seriously affected the speeds achieved by users of ADSL2+ services and that there was a clear downward trend in user speeds with distance from the exchange, which increased markedly the closer it got to 3 km.  We noted, however, O2 only offered their Ultimate Package at point of sale to those customers who were less than 1.25 km away from an exchange, thus reducing the number of customers who would experience speeds well below 20 Mbps. We therefore considered that the body copy disclaimer, "depending on location", was necessary to inform readers that the availability of different O2 packages and the speeds that they could achieve with those packages would depend on their location.  We noted the footnote gave further details of why that might be.  Although the ad was for O2 Home Broadband packages in general, we nonetheless noted the ad featured a prominent speed claim and requested that O2 provide evidence that justified the use of the "up to 20 meg" claim.

We noted Ultimate Package users' performance data sent by O2 demonstrated that the vast majority of their Ultimate Package customers achieved at least the 8 Mbps level of performance. We understood that speeds of 8 Mbps would allow users to take advantage of the vast majority of speed intensive services and functions, such as video streaming and online gaming.  We also noted a reasonable proportion of users could achieve close to the headline speed of 20 Mbps. We noted the ad stated "up to 20 Meg" even though the ADSL2+ technology allowed speeds of 24 Mbps in some circumstances and was qualified with the term 'up to' and considered that readers would not expect all users to achieve the top speed. Although some consumers would not be able to obtain the "up to 20 Mbps" service, we considered that "depending on location" quoted immediately after the speed claim made that clear.  We also noted the footnote further qualified the speed claim by making clear why that was: that speed varied depending on factors including distance from the exchange.   

We concluded that the qualified speed claims in ads for O2's range of broadband products were unlikely to mislead.

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

Action

No further action necessary.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)