ASA Adjudication on Jet2.com Ltd

Ad

An e-mail sent to consumers offering cheap air fares had the headline "April Bargains frm £4.99 with Jet2.com" Text in the body of the e-mail stated "Jet2.com are offering fantastic fares frm £4.99 for travel in April to some amazing destinations ...". A list of destinations at the bottom of the e-mail included "Geneva £9.99".

Issue

Two complainants challenged whether flights were available at the advertised prices. One of the complainants objected that they could not find any flights to Geneva that were available at the advertised price of £9.99 at the time the e-mail was sent.

CAP Code (Edition 11)

Response

Jet2.com Ltd (Jet2) said they ensured that any prices featured in an ad were live in their booking system, and continued to be live, for two weeks following the date of the ad. They said they also ensured that a minimum of 20% of the available fares were available at the lowest advertised price.

Jet2 submitted documentation that showed the proportion of flights to Geneva that were available during the seven-day promotional period following the email newsletter going live. They said 33% of the seats on flights to Geneva in April were available at the advertised fare of £9.99 one way including taxes. Jet2 also sent documentation that showed that, in the period 2nd to 10th April 2008, 30 customers had taken advantage of that offer. They said, if demand exceeded supply, they would instantly add additional fares at the promotional price.

Jet2 said they still had fares available at £9.99 for that route on the Low Fare Finder section of their website. They submitted documentation from their website that they said showed that the £9.99 promotional fare for flights from Leeds Bradford airport to Geneva were available for dates in May, June and August.

Assessment

Upheld

The ASA noted the evidence submitted by Jet2. We accepted that the documentation showed that the minimum advertised fare of £9.99 was available on 33% of the seats on flights to Geneva during April 2008. We also noted that that documentation showed that 30 customers had booked flights to Geneva for £9.99 on a variety of dates at which that fare was available. Nevertheless, we considered that the ad should have stated that the £9.99 fare to Geneva was a "from" price, in order to make it clear to consumers that not all of the fares to Geneva would be available at the advertised price. We also understood from the website documentation submitted by Jet2 that the £9.99 fare excluded a compulsory fuel supplement charge. We considered that the advertised fare should have included all taxes and compulsory charges paid by customers up to and including the point of purchase. Because it did not, and because the ad did not make it clear that the advertised fare was 'from' £9.99, we concluded that the ad was misleading.

The ad breached CAP Code clauses 3.1 (Substantiation), 7.1 (Truthfulness), 15.2 and 15.4 (Prices), 16.1 (Availability of products), 27.4 (Sales promotion rules) and 30.1 (Availability).

Action

The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told Jet2 to make sure that the advertised fare included all compulsory taxes and charges paid at the point of purchase of the ticket. We also told them to make it clear in future advertising that the advertised fare was 'from' a minimum price.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)