Argos Ltd 489-499 Avebury Boulevard Saxon Great West Central Milton Keynes Buckinghamshire MK9 2NW Number of complaints: 1

Date: 20 August 2008 Media: Catalogue Sector: Retail

Ad
An ad in the Argos catalogue, for an HD ready digital LCD TV, stated "£299.99".

Issue
The complainant challenged the availability of the product. He said the Argos website showed the TV was available at several stores. He tried to purchase it in his local area, but was, in each case, offered a different brand of TV in-store and told the product he wanted was out of stock.

The CAP Code:

16.1 (old);7.1;3.1

Response
Argos Ltd (Argos) said the ad for the LCD TV in question had originally been placed on the back of their Spring/Summer 2007 catalogue, a location which usually generated additional interest. They said this had been taken into account when anticipated demand was considered. They said demand for the product during the Spring/Summer 2007 period was 21,000 units and they had already taken in 21,000 pieces of stock from the manufacturer Bush for this product. They said, due to sales, the estimated demand for this product had been revised to 34,000 units. They said they had been unable to obtain further samples of the television from Bush and had therefore taken the decision to offer purchasers a substitute item and had sourced an appropriate number of items from an alternative manufacturer to meet expected demand. By offering a suitable substitute, with the same specification and performance, they believed they were allowing consumers to make an informed choice and this was preferable to disappointing them. They said the substitute TV had been through a formal quality assurance process in order to determine whether or not it was a suitable alternative and they had determined it offered equivalent specification, performance and brand value.

Argos said they informed customers of the presence of a substitute by means of a bulletin read to the customer at the point of purchase. They sent a copy of the text they said appeared on the screen at the till to show that. They said this information was repeated via all channels, including Internet (at point of purchase), ring and reserve and in-store quick pay machines.  They said, additionally, the position relating to substitutes was explained in the customer information in the catalogue.

Argos said they believed offering a substitute product, given that they had been unable to source further stock of the product advertised, was consistent with customers' statutory rights.

Assessment
Upheld
We noted Argos' explanation that they had been unable to source further stock of the Bush TV advertised in their catalogue from the manufacturer and had therefore sourced an equivalent product which they offered as a substitute to customers at the point of sale. We understood that Argos catalogues were produced at half-yearly intervals; nevertheless we considered that to avoid misleading consumers, the ad should have made clear that an equivalent substitute product was on offer due to long-term unavailability of stock. We considered the Argos catalogue could have been modified by the addition of a sticker in this respect, and also considered that website and in-store stock searches should have alerted consumers to the substitution before they reached the point of sale.

The ad breached CAP Code clauses 7.1 (Truthfulness) and 16.1 (Availability).

Action
The ad should not be shown again in its current form.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)