Background
Summary of Council decision:
Three issues were investigated, all of which were Upheld.
Ad description
A paid-for static YouTube ad and website for Harrison & James, an online jewellery retailer, seen in July 2026:
a. The YouTube ad, seen on the YouTube home page, featured an image of a jewellery shop window with text on a poster stating “CLOSING SUNDAY – EVERYTHING FREE” with the word “FREE” underlined. Further text at the bottom of the ad stated “Closing after 46 years Shop now”.
b. The website https://harrisonandjames.com/collections/closure-sale, which was the landing page for the link in ad (a), stated “EVERYTHING FREE STORE WIDE” at the top of the page. It featured an older man and a woman next to a message stating “After 46 years, we’re closing our doors. Everything is free. You only cover shipping”. Further text below stated “After years of pouring our hearts into every piece, it’s time for us to retire. Every creation was made with love, care, and the hope it would bring joy to your life. As our final thank you, we’re giving everything away for free, you only cover shipping. We’d rather these pieces find new homes than sit in storage. Our last pieces are nearly gone, choose yours today. Harrison & James – est. 1980” followed by various jewellery listings.
The product listing page for the Gold Sapphire Halo Ring stated “4.7/5 | 2540+ reviews”. Further down the page it stated “Showcasing some of our 5 star reviews on Trustpilot” and featured two five-star “verified” reviews.
Issue
The ASA received three complaints:
1. two complainants challenged whether the claim “CLOSING SUNDAY” in ad (a) was misleading, because they understood that the company was continuing to trade;
2. two complainants challenged whether the claim “EVERYTHING FREE” in ad (a) and the claims “EVERYTHING FREE STORE WIDE” and “we’re giving everything away for free, you only cover shipping” in ad (b) were misleading, because they understood that the cost of shipping had been inflated; and
3. three complainants challenged whether the claim “4.7/5 | 2540+ reviews” and testimonials in ad (b) were genuine.
Response
1. JPD Retail Ltd t/a Harrison & James stated that the intention to close the business was genuine and that they were in the process of winding down. They said they operated solely online and would cease trading once their remaining stock had been sold. As the business did not have physical premises, the closure was not linked to a lease or fixed date. They had expected the remaining stock to sell sooner, but fluctuating sales volumes meant the closure process had taken longer than anticipated. They said that did not affect their intention to close but made it difficult to give an exact final trading date. They acknowledged that claims such as “Closing Sunday” could be understood as referring to the final closure of the business and said they had reviewed how they communicated specific dates so the ongoing closure was clearer.
2. Harrison & James said the £13.95 UK delivery charge had not been increased to fund or subsidise the “Everything Free” promotion. They said they operated internationally and applied standard delivery charges depending on the market. The products included in the promotion were free, with consumers required only to pay the applicable delivery charge. They said that condition had been made clear from the outset through claims including “Everything Free Storewide – Only Cover Shipping”, which appeared prominently on the website and throughout the customer journey.
3. Harrison & James confirmed that the testimonials were genuine Trustpilot reviews. They stated the reviews had originally been submitted to their previous Trustpilot profile when they used a separate Harrison Liverpool website, before their transition to Harrison & James. They provided links to the original reviews and screenshots from their Trustpilot Business account as supporting evidence. They said abbreviated or display names had been used on the website, to protect the privacy of reviewers, but the testimonial text had come from genuine reviews.
They accepted that the claim “4.7/5 | 2540+ reviews” had not been updated to reflect their latest Trustpilot rating. They said their current Harrison & James Trustpilot profile contained approximately 2,400 reviews and had a rating of approximately 4.1/5. They acknowledged that the rating shown on the website should have been kept up to date and said they had reviewed the matter.
Assessment
1. Upheld
The CAP Code stated marketing communications must not falsely claim that a marketer is about to cease trading or move premises. It further stated they must not falsely state that a product, or the terms on which it is offered, will be available only for a limited time to deprive consumers of the time or opportunity to make an informed choice.
The ASA considered that consumers would understand the claim “CLOSING SUNDAY” in ad (a) to mean that Harrison & James would cease trading on the Sunday following the date on which they saw the ad. We considered that the claim “Closing after 46 years” in ad (a), which we noted similarly appeared in ad (b), also gave the impression that the business was in the final stages of trading.
We acknowledged the explanation given by Harrison & James that they intended to close the business once their remaining stock had been sold, and that the date of closure depended on sales volumes. However, because ad (a) stated that the business was “CLOSING SUNDAY” when there was no fixed date on which the company intended to cease trading, we concluded that the claims were misleading.
On that point, ad (a) breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1 and 3.30 (Availability).
2. Upheld
The CAP Code stated that marketing communications must not describe a product as "free" if the consumer had to pay anything other than the unavoidable cost of responding and collecting or paying for delivery of the item. A marketing communication must not describe a product as “free” if the cost of response, including the price of a product that the consumer must buy to take advantage of the offer, has been increased, except where the increase results from factors that are unrelated to the cost of the promotion.
We considered that consumers would understand the claim “EVERYTHING FREE” in ad (a) and the claims in ad (b) “EVERYTHING FREE STORE WIDE” and “we’re giving everything away for free, you only cover shipping” to mean that the jewellery itself was supplied without charge and that they would pay only the genuine unavoidable cost of delivery.
We understood that consumers in the UK were charged £13.95 for delivery at the time the ads were seen. We acknowledged the statement by Harrison & James that the delivery charge had not been increased to fund or subsidise the product and that it represented their standard delivery charge. We also acknowledged that the need to pay for delivery had been stated on the website. However, Harrison & James had not provided evidence showing that the £13.95 charge represented the cost of delivering the products to consumers in the UK. We also noted that the delivery charge had increased to £23.95 since the complaints were made. We had not seen any evidence to show that the charge was limited to the unavoidable cost of delivery, and so we considered the products could not properly be described as “free”.
We therefore concluded that the “free” claims were misleading.
On that point, the ads breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1 (Misleading advertising), 3.7 (Substantiation) and 3.23 and 3.23.2 (Free).
3. Upheld
We considered that consumers would understand the claim “4.7/5 | 2540+ reviews”, together with the statement “Showcasing some of our 5 star reviews on Trustpilot” and the two displayed testimonials, as factual claims about Harrison & James’ Trustpilot reviews.
We understood from the information provided by the advertiser that on 4 August 2026, the Trustpilot profile for Harrison & James had a rating of 4.1 from 1,662 reviews. We also noted that the number of reviews had since increased to approximately 2,400 on 24 August 2026. However, that did not demonstrate that the claim “2540+ reviews” had been accurate when the ad was seen, and the rating continued to be lower than the advertised figure.
Harrison & James had provided links to Trustpilot reviews which they said corresponded to the two testimonials on the website. We noted that one used the same wording as the published testimonial, while the wording of the other differed. Further, the names shown with the testimonials on the website for Harrison & James differed from those on Trustpilot. Harrison & James said they had used abbreviated or display names to protect reviewers’ privacy. However, the Harrison & James website, seen on 20 July 2026, also stated that the reviews had been left “15 hours ago” and “22 hours ago”, while the Trustpilot reviews provided by Harrison & James were dated in May 2026. We understood that those relative timestamps had remained unchanged on the website since the complaints were made. For those reasons, we considered that Harrison & James had not adequately demonstrated that the testimonials in ad (b) accurately reflected genuine consumer reviews.
We therefore concluded that the overall Trustpilot rating, review count and the presentation of the individual testimonials were misleading.
On that point, ad (b) breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.44 and 3.47 (Endorsements and testimonials).
Action
The ads must not appear again in the form complained of. We told JPD Retail Ltd t/a Harrison & James not to misleadingly state or imply that their business would close on a specific date, if that was not the case. We also told them not to describe products as “free” unless consumers were required to pay only the unavoidable cost of delivery. We further told them to ensure that claims about review ratings, review numbers and individual testimonials were accurate, up to date and supported by adequate evidence.
CAP Code (Edition 12)
3.1 3.7 3.23 3.23.2 3.30 3.44 3.47
