ASA Adjudication on kgb (UK) Ltd
kgb (UK) Ltd
Sterling House
Malthouse Avenue
Cardiff Gate Business Centre
Cardiff
CF23 8RA
Date:
23 May 2012
Media:
Internet (sales promotion)
Sector:
Leisure
Number of complaints:
1
Complaint Ref:
A12-190002
Ad
The website www.kgbdeals.co.uk, visited on 2 February, stated "£35 for a stunning Ladies Rotary watch gift set from Brand Arena worth £75 - save 53% on a timeless gift for a sophisticated lady".
Issue
The complainant challenged whether the savings claim could be substantiated, because it appeared Brand Arena did not sell the watch at the higher price on their own website.
CAP Code (Edition 12)
Response
kgb (UK) Ltd (kgb) said the value and savings claims made in the ad were based on the RRP for the product supplied to them by the merchant on whose behalf they advertised the product. They said the merchant was unable to confirm that they had sold the gift set at the higher price, but that the ladies' watch featured in the ad (but not the gift set, which included a pen) had been offered for sale on three different websites for £61.20, £67.51 and £75 respectively. They said they believed that, had those other websites offered the same gift set they had advertised, they would have done so at prices higher than those at which that they had advertised the watch alone. They stated that, since 20 March 2012, the gift set had been available to consumers at £75 from the merchant's own eBay store.
They believed the offer provided consumers with a significant saving over the price at which the watch alone was generally available and that the addition of the pen as part of the gift set clearly added value to the offer as a whole.
Assessment
Upheld
The ASA noted that the watch that formed part of the gift set had been advertised on other websites at a higher price than kgb had advertised the gift set, and we acknowledged that the gift set, which included a pen, would be of higher value than the watch alone. However, we considered consumers would expect that the gift set was usually sold at the price it was claimed to be worth, or that its constituent products (the watch and the pen) had been sold separately at prices which were equal to this figure when added together. Although we noted that the gift set had been offered on the merchant's eBay store for £75 after the complainant saw the offer on the kgb website, we noted that at the time the offer appeared the savings claim had been based on the merchant's RRP, not the price at which the product or its constituent parts had previously been sold. Because we had not seen evidence that demonstrated the gift set was generally sold at the higher price before the ad appeared, we concluded that the savings claim had not been substantiated and was likely to mislead.
The claim breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1 (Misleading advertising), 3.7 (Substantiation) and 3.17 (Prices).
Action
The claim must not appear again in its current form. We told kgb to ensure that savings claims in future were based on the price at which the advertised products were generally sold.
