ASA Adjudication on Alra Clothing Ltd

Ad

A circular for a clothing collection company was headlined "Clothing Appeal for ASTHMA charity". Smaller text in the body of the leaflet stated "Dear Householder, Your unwanted clothes could really be benefit [sic] to someone. We help poor families, disabled people and orphan children no matter what country they live in. All your donated goods will be sorted, baled and shipped directly to Eastern Europe countrys [sic] to improve their lives and welfare".

Further text gave instructions on what items were suitable for donation and how they would be collected and also stated "This collection is autohorised [sic] by a collection permit issued by your local council". Smaller text at the very bottom of the leaflet gave an e-mail address starting "asthmacharityeu@xxxx.xxx" and stated "Company No. 7157890".

Issue

The complainant challenged whether the ad was misleading because it implied that the advertiser was a charity.

CAP Code (Edition 11)

Response

Alra Clothing Ltd (Alra) enquired about the nature of the complaint but did not respond fully to the ASA's enquiries. They said they had not produced the ad and were unaware of it.

Assessment

Upheld

The ASA was concerned by Alra's lack of response and apparent disregard for the Code, which was a breach of CAP Code Clause 2.6 (non-response). We reminded them of their responsibility to respond promptly to our enquiries and told them to do so in future.

We noted Alra's argument that the ad was not theirs. However, we also noted that the ad carried their contact details and company number.

We considered that the headline "Clothing Appeal for ASTHMA Charity", the reference to "donated goods" and "bogus collections" in the body of the ad, and the email address

would be interpreted by consumers to mean that Alra Clothing was a registered charity. Because we had not seen evidence that that was the case, we concluded the ad was misleading.

The ad breached CAP Code clauses 2.6 (Non-response), 3.1 (Substantiation), 7.1 and 7.2 (Truthfulness)

Action

The ad must not appear again in its current form.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)