Posted: 20th Jul, 2011 By: MarkJ


The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has
upheld two complaints made by ISP BT against a TV advert for broadband internet and phone services from TalkTalk UK. BT alleged that the "
Save over £140" claims promoted in the advert were "
exaggerated" and based on questionable survey data. The ASA agreed.
ASA Ruling - 2 Complaints Upheld
We did not consider that that methodology was sufficiently robust to support a savings claim because customers who had switched to TalkTalk were more likely to have done so if they were going to make a saving, and the survey results were therefore unlikely to include data for customers for whom a switch would result in either no saving at all or only a small saving. We therefore considered that the survey results could not show that customers of other providers would definitely make a substantial saving if they also switched.
Although it had not been TalkTalk's intention to make such a claim, we considered that the survey results were not sufficiently robust to support the likely interpretation of the definite savings claim made in the ad. We concluded that the ad exaggerated the savings that customers to whom the ad was addressed were likely to achieve and was misleading.
As per usual the ASA has warned TalkTalk that its advert "
must not be shown again in its current form" because it breached BCAP Code rules 3.1, 3.2 (Misleading advertising), 3.9 (Substantiation) and 3.12 (Exaggeration).
Full ASA Report
http://www.asa.org.uk/ASA-action/Adjudications/2011/7/TalkTalk-Telecom-Ltd/SHP_ADJ_149509.aspx