Background
This Ruling forms part of a wider piece of work on misleadingness and imitation in ads for accident claims management companies. The ads were identified for investigation following intelligence gathered by our Active Ad Monitoring system, which uses AI to proactively search for online ads that might break the rules. See also related rulings published on 7 January 2026.
Ad description
Two paid-for Google search listings and two websites for Adminall Accident Tel and Hastings Accident Tel, an accident claims management company, seen on 4 July 2025:
a. The first paid-for Google search result featured the URLs “adminall.accident.tel” and “adminall.accident.tel/admiral/department”. Headline text beneath stated “Admiral Car Insurance Claim – Make a Claim”. Further text stated “Non Fault Accident – Call now to Check if you can claim in less then [sic] 30 seconds-Free Number […] Accident Claims Line Quality Work Done Quickly 100% Confidential Advice 24/7 Insurance Claim Helpline”.
b. The second paid-for Google search result featured the URLs “hastings.accident.tel” and “hastings.accident.tel/hasting/claim”. Headline text beneath stated “Report Your Hasting Claim – Car Insurance Claims Number”. Further text stated “If You Need to Report a Claim, Our Expert & Friendly Team are Ready to Help You Anytime Make Sure You Get What You deserve, Find Out if You Can Claim […]”.
c. The first website, www.adminall.accident.tel/, was the landing page for ad (a). It featured text which stated “Make a Claim Advisors available in our UK based Call Centre. Need Roadside Recovery? [phone number] Make a Claim [phone number]”. Below was a “Terms and Policies” button with a broken link. Further text stated “We provide assistance with roadside recovery and car hire these aspects of our service are not regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. In respect of minor personal injury claims, you do not need to use the services of a claims management company to make your claim, you may be able to do this yourself for free through the Official Injury Claim portal […] Any garages or car hire company we recommend you to is an independent professional from whom you will receive impartial and confidential advice and service. Your [sic] are free to choose another firm of your choice.”
d. The second website, www.hastings.accident.tel/, was the landing page for ad (b). It featured text which stated “Make a Claim Advisors available 24/7 in our UK based Call Centre. Need Roadside Recovery? [phone number]”. Text below stated, “Current callers in queue: 2 – Average wait time: 1-3 minutes”. Further text stated “Make a Claim [phone number]”. Text below stated “Current callers in queue: 4 – Average wait time: 3-4 minutes Existing claims [phone number]”. Below was a “Terms and Policies” button with a broken link. Further text below stated “We charge our garages for the marketing services we provide. The marketing costs are not passed on to any of our customers and have no impact on the level of service or compensation you receive. Our 'No Win No Fee' solicitors typically charge customers anywhere from 25%-40% from the compensation awarded, although this will be subject to your individual circumstances and the accident type. The actual fee may be less than this, but it will never be more. Please refer to our terms and policies page for more information. Any solicitor or car hire company we recommend you to is an independent professional from whom you will receive impartial and confidential advice. You are free to choose another firm of your choice”.
Issue
The ASA challenged whether the ads, by implying they were for a car insurance provider, falsely implied that the marketer was acting for purposes outside its business and did not make clear their commercial intent.
Response
The legal representative of Freedom Debt Ltd t/a adminall.accident.tel and hastings.accident.tel said their client was an online leads aggregator who helped local, registered and regulated businesses to get qualified leads for accident recovery, car hire and damage repair.
Regarding the name “Hastings”, they said Hastings Direct insurance was formed in 1997, which was over 1,000 years after the town of Hastings was named, so Hastings Direct did not have trademark rights on the word “Hastings”. Moreover, because Hastings was a town, any search terms such as “Hastings accident helpline” would be similar to using any other town or city name for the same purpose, for example, “London accident helpline” or “London accident recovery”.
They had advised their client to stop running any ads using the name “Hastings” or the web address Hastings.accident.tel. The same was advised regarding adminall.accident.tel. Those web addresses and websites would also not be used to run any campaigns in future.
Assessment
Upheld
The CAP Code stated that marketing communications must not falsely claim or imply that the marketer is acting as a consumer or for purposes outside its trade, business, craft or profession. It further stated that marketing communications must make clear their commercial intent, if that was not apparent from the context.
We understood that the company behind adminall.accident.tel and hastings.accident.tel was an online leads aggregator that obtained consumers’ information for passing on to accident recovery, car hire and damage repair companies, in the case of non-fault accidents. It had no direct connection to either Admiral or Hastings Direct insurance companies and therefore could not assist customers of those companies in making a claim on their insurance policy following an accident.
Ads (a) and (b) featured the claims “Admiral Car Insurance Claim – Make a Claim” and “Report Your Hasting Claim – Car Insurance Claims Number”. They also featured web addresses which contained the words “adminall”, “admiral”, “hastings” and “accident”. Admiral and Hastings Direct were well known as insurance companies and the ASA considered that the ads presented themselves as being from those companies. We considered consumers were therefore likely to understand that by clicking on those links, they could contact the Admiral and Hastings Direct claims departments following a motor accident.
Ads (c) and (d), the website landing pages for the links in ads (a) and (b), had the web addresses “www.adminall.accident.tel/” and “www.hastings.accident.tel/”. Ad (c) featured the claim “Make a Claim Advisors available in our UK based Call Centre. Need Roadside Recovery? [phone number] Make a Claim [phone number]” and ad (d) stated “Make a Claim Advisors available 24/7 in our UK based Call Centre. Need Roadside Recovery? [phone number]”.
We considered those claims further contributed to the impression that customers of Admiral or Hastings insurance would be able to begin processing their accident claims through those websites, which was not the case. We noted that the spelling of ‘Admiral’ in the URLs in ads (a) and (c) was ‘adminall’ but we considered because of the similarity in the spelling, and given the context in which the wording appeared, the incorrect spelling of Admiral was likely to be overlooked by consumers, in particular given that ad (a) also used the correct spelling of “Admiral”.
We noted that text further down the webpage of ad (c ) stated “In respect of minor personal injury claims, you do not need to use the services of a claims management company to make your claim” and ad (d) stated “Our ‘No Win No Fee’ solicitors typically charge customers anywhere from 25%-40% from the compensation awarded […]”. However, we considered the lack of prominence meant consumers were likely to overlook that text, and that in any event it was insufficient to alter the overall impression of the ads, that consumers were contacting an insurer directly.
We considered further that consumers were likely to be unaware of the nature of the service being offered in the ads, an online leads aggregator, and of the potential costs and risks of not contacting their insurer. For example, we understood there were potential costs associated with a replacement vehicle, which we understood was generally provided on a credit hire basis, costs for vehicle repairs or storage costs charged by the businesses they were referred to. In addition, we understood there was a risk of loss of specific benefits under a consumer’s own insurance policy, or of impact on existing insurance cover if they did not notify their own insurer of an accident, irrespective of whether a claim was made.
Because adminall.accident.tel and hastings.accident.tel misleadingly presented themselves as insurance providers and did not make clear they were collecting personal information for lead generation purposes, we considered the ads falsely implied they were acting for purposes outside their trade, business, craft or profession and did not make clear their commercial intent. We concluded that the ads breached the Code.
Ads (a), (b), (c) and (d) breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rule 2.3 (Recognition of marketing communications).
Action
The ads must not appear again in the form complained of. We told Freedom Debt Ltd t/a adminall.accident.tel, hastings.accident.tel to ensure they did not falsely imply they were acting for purposes outside of their trade, and to ensure that their future marketing communications made clear that their purpose was to gather consumer’s personal information for lead generation.
