Using Me!

Advertising Standards

I can’t believe I forgot to blog about this!

A well known UK internet shop that specialises in gifts/gadgets sent me an email before Christmas advertising the latest additions to its catalogue. The main part of the image-based email was a large advert for a watch. Particularly a watch that looked exactly like this one here or here.

The watch is made with Tourmaline and claims to improve circulation, relieve stress and several other claims are made of the same ilk.

Since I knew this was all Bullshit! (TM Penn and Teller) I decided to make a complaint. It’s a bit complicated to work out exactly who you have to complain to but eventually I worked out I could approach the Advertising Standards Authority under one sections of their remit:

• Commercial e-mail and SMS text message ads

You would have thought that I could also complain to the ASA about the advert on the website, but that is not covered by their remit, bizarrely:

• Advertisements on the Internet, including banner and display ads and paid-for (sponsored) search (not claims on companies’ own websites)

For the advert on their website I had to look further. First I headed over to Consumer Direct. That didn’t help much though as their advice covers how to go about making complaints on transactions you have been involved in.

Trading Standards were the people I wanted, not to be confused with the Office of Fair Trading, although I couldn’t tell you why both exist or what each do. Trading Standards is a function of each county council. But when you drill down through the web pages you find out that, even though you (I) couldn’t find it there, you actually need to go and talk to Consumer Direct!

So I did. I emailed them and they passed my query to my council’s trading standards department (even though I had shown that the company and its website were based in a different region, ‘whois’ rocks!).

Oh, my complaint! I simply pointed out that the claims made in the advert and the email were unsubstantiated, citing the lack of any medical papers on the subject etc etc.

I never did hear anything back from Trading Standards but they apparently don’t normally contact the complainant anyway. They investigate and take action. Whether they did do anything I don’t know. I hope so!

But I did get a response from the ASA. Two letters. One came in about a month after my complaint, on December 21st, stating what their procedures would involve them doing – contacting the company and asking them to comment on the complaint and provide evidence to backup their claims before making a decision.

The second letter came on 4th February and it states:

We contacted ##### Ltd to ask for their comments on the complaint and for them to submit evidence to substantiate their claims. They responded by advising that the claims were given to them by a third party supplier and that they had subsequently withdrawn the ad with no plans to use it again.

We reminded ##### of the responsibility of advertisers under the CAP Code to ensure that the claims they publish are supported by robust evidence. However in light of their response, we no longer believe that there is a need to put the matter to the ASA Council for an adjudication. Instead we have sought a written assurance from ##### that th claims will not be used again.

One piece of Woo/Bullshit! (TM Penn and Teller) down. Several million to go.