Background

Summary of Council decision:

Three issues were investigated, of which two were Upheld and one was Not upheld.

Ad description

A website for GoDaddy, www.uk.godaddy.com, seen in September and October 2017, included a page titled “WordPress Solutions” which showed four monthly price “plan” options for WordPress hosting services, ranging from the “Basic” option “As low as £2.99/mo” to the “Developer…As low as £10.99/mo”. Below the price statement text an orange button stated “Configure”. A second page, a search result for a domain name, stated “Yes! Your domain is available” and displayed a headline price statement of £0.01 with £9.99 crossed out. Smaller text below the price stated “when you register 2 years or more. 1st year price £0.01. Additional years £9.99”. Below that the web page stated “Protect your name with these domains” followed by a list including the searched-for domain name and similar domain names and their prices. The searched-for domain name listing included the same price statement and smaller text referenced above. Two of the suggested domains displayed price statements of £0.99 with £13.10 crossed out. A third page, showing a “Privacy Protection” plan as an optional add-in during the domain purchasing process, included a price statement of “£4.99 /domain per year”.

Issue

The complainant challenged whether:

1. the monthly price claims on the WordPress Solutions page were misleading because the monthly price options had to be paid as an upfront annual sum.

2. the price claims for the domain names, which were based only on the first year price, were misleading because they were available at the advertised price for one year only and then reverted to a higher rate for additional years.

3. the price for privacy cover was misleading because they understood the cover was not available to purchase on a year-by-year basis and had to be bought for the duration the domain name was purchased.

Response

1. In regard to the per month pricing statements, for example “£2.99/mo”, GoDaddy Operating Company LLC said that customers had the ability to configure their order in the cart to select the annual service term that would equate to that monthly price, and therefore their stated pricing and the cart process on the website were not misleading.

2. GoDaddy said the advertised domain prices for the first year, for example £0.01, stated that for any term of two years or more, the first year would be £0.01 and the second year (and any additional years) would be priced at the higher crossed-out price of £9.99 per year. They added that the lower first year price was only available as part of the “2 years or more” domain term offer, and therefore was not available for a one year term only.

GoDaddy said sufficient information was provided to consumers through the purchasing process to ensure that they understood the pricing breakdown of the domain names. They stated that the ‘Cart’ page allowed the consumer to pick a term length and then clearly indicated the applicable price for each year of the term, based on the term length that the customer chose. In addition, the Cart page provided a “Taxes & Fees” pop up box which provided a breakdown of the applicable fees for the customer, for example the ICANN and VAT fees.

3. GoDaddy said that when customers purchased a domain name and added privacy protection to that domain, the cover was always for the full term of the domain in order to ensure that the customer’s personal information was hidden for the entire term. They said the total cost of the domain would be adjusted accordingly in the checkout stage to include the additional privacy cover fees, at the advertised yearly rate.

GoDaddy believed it was logical that customers would want the privacy cover for the full domain term. They stated that at the initial domain purchasing stage customers were not able to purchase privacy cover for a timeframe shorter than the domain term, but it was possible to cancel the cover at any time afterwards. If the cover was not initially purchased, it could be added on at any point during the term at a pro-rated yearly price, according to the remaining duration before the domain term’s expiration. They also said there were no explicit statements on the website stating that domain privacy must be purchased for the full duration of the domain name term, because they believed it was self-evident to customers that it would be aligned with the length of the domain.

Assessment

1. Upheld

The ASA considered that consumers would understand the claim “As low as £2.99/mo”, to mean that the “Basic” product was available at £2.99 per month, and that they would expect it was possible to pay for the service on a monthly basis. In the context of the ad, which included a prominent button stating “Configure” indicating that options would be offered in order to build a WordPress hosting plan, we also considered consumers would be likely to understand that not all plans were priced at £2.99 per month, but there would be a reasonable chance of selecting a plan priced at £2.99 that suited their needs.

The full cost of the hosting service was required to be paid at the time of purchase, for the full chosen service length, and it was not payable on a monthly basis. While the service was available to purchase for one month only, in order to achieve the “from” price of £2.99 it had to be purchased for a minimum term of three years. We considered that pricing and payment information was material information that was likely to affect consumers’ understanding of the offer. However, we considered the ad had not made sufficiently clear that it was not possible to pay for the service on a monthly basis and that the full cost of the domain was required at the time of purchase. Additionally it was not sufficiently clear that a minimum term length of three years was required to purchase the plan at the “from” price of £2.99. For those reasons, we concluded the ad was misleading.

On that point 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.  (Qualification) and  3.17 3.17 Price statements must not mislead by omission, undue emphasis or distortion. They must relate to the product featured in the marketing communication.  (Prices).

2. Upheld

We considered that consumers would be likely to understand the headline price statement, in conjunction with the statement “when you register for two years or more. 1st year price £0.01. Additional years £9.99”, to mean the searched-for domain name would be available at £0.01 for the first year and £9.99 for additional years, when purchased for at least two years. However, as some of the similar domain names listed below were displayed differently without any information about the minimum duration required to achieve the lower price, or the prices for the first year and additional years, we considered consumers would not understand that the same conditions applied to the stated prices for those domain names.

We considered the text accompanying the headline price statement made clear that the searched-for domain had to be purchased for two years or more in order to achieve the stated price of £0.01 for the first year and £9.99 for following years. We concluded that price claim was therefore not misleading to consumers. However, because we understood the same conditions applied to the prices stated for other similar domain names, but that was not made clear, we concluded those price claims were misleading. We therefore concluded the ad was misleading.

On that point 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.  (Qualification) and  3.17 3.17 Price statements must not mislead by omission, undue emphasis or distortion. They must relate to the product featured in the marketing communication.  (Prices).

3. Not upheld

We considered consumers would understand the claim “£4.99 /domain per year” to mean that there was an additional fee of £4.99 per year for the optional privacy cover for each domain name they purchased. Additionally, while the ad did not state that privacy cover must be purchased for the entire duration of the domain term, we considered that consumers would be likely to expect the privacy protection to run for the full length of the domain term they were purchasing, and therefore that the yearly cost would be multiplied by the number of years for which they were purchasing the domain.

We understood that the privacy cover was available at the advertised yearly price of £4.99, and this was multiplied by each year of a domain term. We also noted the default setting on the website was that privacy protection would not be added to a selected domain name, unless the consumer opted in to that cover. Because it was possible to purchase the privacy cover at the advertised cost per year, and we considered that the claim “£4.99 /domain per year” would be understood to be the price charged per year for the full domain term, we concluded the ad was not misleading in that regard.

On that point we investigated the ad under 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.  (Qualification) and  3.17 3.17 Price statements must not mislead by omission, undue emphasis or distortion. They must relate to the product featured in the marketing communication.  (Prices), but did not find it in breach.

Action

The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told GoDaddy Operating Company LLC to ensure that in future it made clear that the total cost for the chosen duration of WordPress hosting services must be paid upfront, rather than on a monthly basis. Additionally, they must make clear other conditions associated with their price claims, for example, the minimum length of service required to purchase a WordPress hosting service at the stated “from” price, and for domain name purchases the minimum duration required to achieve the lower price, and that the two stated prices related to the costs for the first year and additional years.

CAP Code (Edition 12)

3.1     3.17     3.3     3.9    


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