Ad description
An Ebuyer ad on Facebook for a child's trike stated "£24.99 DELIVERED*" and "Free delivery*". Further text stated "*Please note excludes Northern Ireland, Eire, Scottish Offshore, Scottish Highlands, Channel Islands and Isle of Man".
Issue
The complainant challenged whether the claim "free delivery" was misleading because they were unable to take advantage of the 'free delivery' offer despite not living in the exclusion zones.
Response
Ebuyer (UK) Ltd (Ebuyer) did not respond to the ASA's enquiries.
Assessment
Upheld
The ASA was concerned by Ebuyer's lack of response and apparent disregard for the Code, which was a breach of CAP Code (Edition 12) rule 1.7 (Unreasonable delay). We reminded them of their responsibility to respond promptly to our enquiries and told them to do so in future.
Because Ebuyer had not demonstrated that free delivery was genuinely available to all consumers who did not live in the exclusion zones referred to in the ad, we concluded that the claims "£24.99 delivered" and "Free delivery" were misleading.
The ad breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules
3.1
3.1
Marketing communications must not materially mislead or be likely to do so.
3.3
3.3
Marketing communications must not mislead the consumer by omitting material information. They must not mislead by hiding material information or presenting it in an unclear, unintelligible, ambiguous or untimely manner.
Material information is information that the consumer needs to make informed decisions in relation to a product. Whether the omission or presentation of material information is likely to mislead the consumer depends on the context, the medium and, if the medium of the marketing communication is constrained by time or space, the measures that the marketer takes to make that information available to the consumer by other means.
(Misleading advertising),
3.9
3.9
Marketing communications must state significant limitations and qualifications. Qualifications may clarify but must not contradict the claims that they qualify.
and
3.10
3.10
Qualifications must be presented clearly.
CAP has published a Help Note on Claims that Require Qualification.
(Qualifications).
Action
The ad should not appear again in its current form. We referred the matter to the CAP Compliance Team.
