ASA Adjudication on Canterbury Eco Homes

Ad

A radio ad promoted a competition to win a new home. A male voice stated "What would you do if you won a brand new eco-friendly home?" One person replied "I'd live in it", another said "I'd sell it". The male voice continued "Well the choice is yours thanks to an amazing competition from Canterbury Eco Homes ... to win this fantastic sought-after home in Canterbury, simply visit Canterburyecohomes.co.uk."

Issue

The listener challenged whether the ad was misleading, because it did not make clear that you had to pay to enter the competition.

BCAP Radio Code

Response

Canterbury Eco Homes said the fact that they were advertising a competition did not mean that the competition was free to enter. They said the ad did not use any misleading terminology or phrasing that implied the competition was free to enter, and there was nothing in the ad that gave that impression. Although they acknowledged that some listeners may think it reasonable that a house was given away for free, they argued that most people would understand that such a high value competition was not free to enter.

They emphasised that the ad was extremely limited in length and therefore not every detail could be included. However, they said that in their newspaper ads they had made clear that the competition cost £10 to enter. They said that as soon as a listener logged onto the competition homepage it became clear that it was a pay to enter competition.  They said they had no economic interest in misleading people and they had not set out to deliberately mislead, as was clear from their press advertising.

The Radio Advertising Clearance Centre (RACC) said the line "to win ... simply visit canterburyecohomes.co.uk" was both accurate and sufficient to alert consumers to the availability of a legal prize competition, to be conducted via the website highlighted in the ad. They said they did not feel that the £10 entry fee was a significant condition that would affect a consumers decision to enter or, subsequently, that its omission would materially mislead consumers. In addition, they said they felt that consumers would not necessarily expect the competition to be free and that they would not need to spend an unreasonable amount of time to find out that payment was required to enter. They said that 30 seconds was a limited amount of time in which to specify a low-priced entry fee, but that the advertiser had ensured that the fee was stated clearly on their website.

Assessment

Upheld

The ASA noted Canterbury Eco Homes and the RACC's comments. We noted Canterbury Eco Home's assertion that they had not intended to mislead consumers, and that although time was limited in the radio ad, they had ensured the press advertising that formed part of the same campaign made clear there was a £10 fee to enter the competition.  However, because we considered the £10 entry fee was a significant condition likely to affect a listener's decision to visit the website and enter the competition, we considered it should have been included in the ad.  Because it was not, we concluded the ad was misleading.

The ad breached CAP (Broadcast) Radio Advertising Standards Code section 2, rule 3.1 (Misleadingness).

Action

The ad must not be broadcast again in its current form.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Broadcast)