Ad description
A magazine ad for a commercial laundry company, in May 2011, had the headline "WE ARE READY FOR GUIDELINE CHANGES AND CQC INSPECTIONS ARE YOU?" above an image of a Petri dish containing bacteria. Text underneath the picture stated "5 years on, OTEX is still the only proven method of decontamination for your laundry". Bullet-pointed text stated "Kills MRSA and C. difficile and validates on all wash cycles ... The ONLY laundry product to receive Rapid Review Panel 1 status from the Department of Health".
Issue
Armstrong Commercial Laundry Systems challenged whether the claim "OTEX is still the only proven method of decontamination for your laundry" was misleading and could be substantiated.
Response
JLA Ltd (JLA) said numerous reports and tests showed that OTEX eradicated all traces of contamination, and they believed the product was therefore a proven method of decontamination. They said in 2010 OTEX was awarded the highest level classification (class one) from the NHS Rapid Review Panel (RRP) for infection control, the only laundry product to do so. JLA said the RRP stated that OTEX was more effective in decontamination than other laundry systems. JLA said there was only one other company that also used an ozone system, but that that system had not been validated or analysed by any external bodies. In contrast, OTEX produced validation on every wash, either via a machine indicator or printed report. They therefore believed they were entitled to claim that OTEX was the only proven system. JLS provided copies of the reports on OTEX and the documents submitted for the RRP application.
JLA said they believed their tests showed that OTEX was the only system that killed all microorganisms, including bacteria, yeasts, moulds and viruses. They explained that the next best system for laundry decontamination was a thermal system, but that it had been proven to be inferior to the ozone method, as had other chemical disinfectants. JLA said concerns had been raised with the healthcare profession about the apparent resistance to standard thermal wash temperatures and the ability of spore forming Clostridium difficile to survive. They provided a copy of a letter published in the Journal of Hospital Infection on that subject.
Assessment
Upheld
The ASA considered that consumers would interpret the claim "OTEX is still the only proven method of decontamination for your laundry" to mean that there was no other demonstrable or verified method of laundry decontamination. We noted the documentation provided showed that OTEX was a proven, effective method of decontamination, but also noted that we had not seen comparative evidence that showed that other decontamination methods were not effective. Notwithstanding that, we understood that decontamination could be achieved by a number of methods, which fell into the three categories of cleaning, disinfection and sterilisation, and that the current NHS Executive laundry decontamination guidance for used and infected linen utilised thermal disinfection methods. We also understood that the majority of laundries that serviced the NHS used quality systems based on the thermal disinfection of laundry. We therefore considered that thermal disinfection had been demonstrated to be an effective method of decontamination for laundry, and consequently that the claim that OTEX was the "only proven" method had not been substantiated. We therefore concluded that the claim "OTEX is still the only proven method of decontamination for your laundry" was 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.
and
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),
3.7
3.7
Before distributing or submitting a marketing communication for publication, marketers must hold documentary evidence to prove claims that consumers are likely to regard as objective and that are capable of objective substantiation. The ASA may regard claims as misleading in the absence of adequate substantiation.
(Substantiation) and
3.38
3.38
Marketing communications that include a comparison with an unidentifiable competitor must not mislead, or be likely to mislead, the consumer. The elements of the comparison must not be selected to give the marketer an unrepresentative advantage.
(Other comparisons).
Action
The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told JLA not to claim that OTEX was the only proven method of laundry decontamination.
