Ad description
A paid-for Google ad for Extreme Locks Ltd’s website www.mikejmartin/auto-locksmith, a vehicle locksmith, seen on 31 January 2019, included the text “Local 24 hour emergency locksmiths for all vehicle related security issues”.Issue
The complainant challenged whether the claim “Local 24 hour emergency locksmiths” was misleading and could be substantiated.Response
Extreme Locks Ltd did not respond to the ASA’s enquiries.Assessment
Upheld
The ASA was concerned at Extreme Locks Ltd’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 provide a response to our enquiries and told them to do so in future. The website appeared as a paid-for search result on Google when the complainant searched for an ‘emergency locksmith in Edinburgh’. We considered that consumers would interpret the claim “local” to mean that the advertiser was a local company that was physically located in Edinburgh. However, we had seen no evidence to show that Extreme Locks Ltd had offices in Edinburgh and noted that their registered address was in Oldham. For that reason, we considered that the claim "Local … locksmiths” was misleading and breached the Code. The ad breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1 and 3.3 (Misleading advertising), and 3.7 (Substantiation).
Action
The ad must not appear again in the form complained about. We told Extreme Locks Ltd not to make claims that implied they were a local company unless they held evidence to substantiate those claims. This matter was referred to the CAP Compliance team.
