ASA Adjudication on British Gas Trading Ltd

Ad

A series of posters, regional press ads and transport ads claimed that British Gas offered the cheapest electricity in the part of London in which the ad appeared, for example, "We're Fulham's cheapest electricity provider." A footnote stated "Cheapest claim is based on average annual consumption of 3,300 kWh for single rate electricity paying by either Quarterly Cash or Cheque or by Monthly Direct Debit and against standard prices. Excludes prompt payment discounts. Prices as at 11th November 2008."

Issue

EDF objected that the claims were misleading, because the footnote excluded consumers on pre-payment meters and similar schemes, some of whom, they maintained, were on cheaper tariffs.

CAP Code (Edition 11)

Response

British Gas Trading Ltd (British Gas) said the footnote made clear that the claim was applicable only to those who paid by Quarterly cash or cheque or monthly direct debit. They pointed out that those methods of payment were not open to pre-payment customers.  British Gas believed the footnote qualified the claim clearly and its size was more than sufficient to draw consumers' attention to it.  British Gas maintained that it would not be unreasonable to assume that an average consumer would have read the qualification or, alternatively, have understood that qualifications applied to the claim in the ad.  

British Gas maintained that the claim that they were the cheapest provider for electricity in the named areas of London was true for the vast majority of customers in the four electricity supply regions that supplied electricity within the boundaries of the 32 boroughs that comprise London.  They said the vast majority of households, some 87.75%, had credit meters whereas only around 12.25% of households had pre-payment meters.  Consequently, they asserted that the claim was true for the vast majority of customers in the named London areas.  

British Gas also said they had obtained advice on the ads from the CAP Copy Advice Team and they had not raised an objection.  They stressed that they endeavoured to ensure that their advertising complied with the CAP Code. They pointed out that many of their competitors followed a similar approach in their advertising, using a footnote to clarify the exclusions to a claim. They sent several examples of their competitors ads.

Assessment

Upheld

The ASA noted British Gas' assertions that the claim in conjunction with the qualification was unlikely to mislead and the claim itself was accurate for the vast majority of consumers in the areas that featured in the ads.  We understood that the CAP Copy Advice team had advised that, for it to be acceptable, the claim could not be subject to significant conditions that contradicted it. We understood that certain pre-payment meters provided electricity, by a different supplier, at a lower price than that provided by British Gas.  We considered that readers were likely to infer that the ad was an encouragement to switch electricity provider and noted it was possible to switch pre-payment provider. We also considered that such prominent and absolute claims as "We're Fulham's cheapest electricity provider" were likely to lead readers to expect that no cheaper commercial tariff was available in the area.  Because a cheaper tariff was available, we concluded that the ads were likely to mislead.

The ad breached CAP Code clauses 3.1 (Substantiation), 7.1 (Truthfulness) and 19.1 (Other comparisons).

Action

The ads must not appear again in their current form. We told British Gas amend the claim to make clear that they were the cheapest for customers on non pre-payment tariffs.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)