ASA Adjudication on Cartel Client Review Ltd

Ad

A radio ad for a credit card compensation company stated "How much do you owe on your credit card? Is it still your flexible friend? Probably not. Did you know that if you took your credit card out before April 2007 your outstanding balance could be completely written off? Cartel Client Review can check your credit cards to see if you can claim to have your balance completely cleared. To find out more visit cartelclientreview.co.uk or call 0845 XXX XXXX, 0845 XXX XXXX. Terms and conditions apply".

Issue

One listener challenged whether the ad misleadingly implied that a person had a good chance of having their credit card debts written off if they had taken the credit card out before April 2007, because they believed the circumstances in which that was possible were limited.

BCAP Radio Code

Response

Cartel Client Review Ltd (Cartel Client Review) submitted a document that explained how a credit card agreement becomes unenforceable. They submitted a link to a TV programme, which they said showed that lenders were being forced to wipe the balances off credit card agreements.

The Radio Advertising Clearance Centre (RACC) said they understood that, since April 2007, the courts were more willing to write off or reduce credit card debt. They said they were satisfied that there was a legal basis for the claim, and they pointed out that the ad carefully stated that listeners "could" have their credit card debts written off. The RACC said they were reviewing their policy on these types of claims in light of the current economic climate.

The RACC submitted a link to a radio programme about unenforceable loans and an article in The Times from February 2007 on the same subject. They also provided three letters, from a firm of solicitors and two banks, which they said showed that consumers had been successful in having their credit card debts written off.

Assessment

Upheld

The ASA noted the information provided by the advertiser and the RACC. We also noted that the radio programme and newspaper article referred to unsecured personal loans and not to credit card debt, and that only one of the three letters related to the writing off of a consumer's credit card debt. We acknowledged that one of the legal representatives interviewed in the TV programme stated that his firm had managed to have the credit card and loan debts of around 1000 clients written off, but we also noted that it was not clear what proportion of those debts were from credit cards and that consumers needed to be able to demonstrate that serious prejudice had occurred in drawing up their credit agreement. Notwithstanding that, we considered that we had not seen evidence that demonstrated the number of Cartel Client Review's clients that had successfully won their claim to have their credit card debts written off, or that showed what proportion of their total client base the successful clients represented.

We understood from the information provided by Cartel Client Review and the RACC that the advertised service for clearing an outstanding credit card debt involved legal proceedings, which we also understood could be a potentially lengthy and complex process. We considered that the ad implied that the key factor in determining whether a consumer's credit card balance could be cleared was the date of issue of the card. We also considered that we had not seen evidence that demonstrated that that was the case, or that demonstrated that significant numbers of consumers had had their credit card debts written off in that way. We therefore concluded that the ad was misleading.

The ad breached CAP (Broadcast) Radio Advertising Standards Code section 2-3 (Misleadingness).

Action

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

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Broadcast)