A host of broadband firms including Virgin, BT and EE have had adverts banned by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) as the regulator cracks down on murkily conveyed mid-contract prices.
Plusnet, TalkTalk, O2 and Telefonica UK also came under fire for failing to be transparent over prices, over the rises which happen when a provider hikes bills in the middle of a contract term.
The crackdown comes in the wake of Ofcom’s move to ban broadband firms from mid-contract price hikes linked to inflation.
Each of the banned adverts fell foul of guidelines around misleading advertising and price qualification.
An ASA spokesperson said: “Our monitoring sweep of ads for broadband contracts and data plans, prompted through complaints and our own intelligence gathering, has uncovered examples of multiple operators breaking the rules by not presenting mid-contract price rises clearly.”
“This is material information that people need to be made aware of, upfront, so that they can make an informed choice. The guidance came into effect last year and advertisers have had fair warning to give prominence to future price rises in their ads.”
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For example, the BT advert featured the headline ‘Get Ultrafast Full Fibre 100 for only £29.99 a month’, with six packages listed. However, small text underneath read ‘Increases 31 March by £3.24 per month’.
While BT believed it had fairly qualified the deal, the ASA argued that because the placement was not clear, it was likely to mislead.
The rulings for Virgin, TalkTalk, EE and Telefonica UK, all similarly centred around a failure to be clear through placement that was hard to follow, text that was difficult to read or use of an asterix which was removed from the main text.
The ASA ruled that each of the ads was banned and must not appear again. The firms were urged to ensure that they make it clear when broadband contracts are subject to mid-term price rises, and to ensure that information about the price rises is presented prominently.
Research from the consumer watchdog Which? last year estimated that major UK telecoms providers would make almost £500m from mid-term, inflation-linked price hikes.
Customer price index (CPI) inflation meant that households were faced with paying up to 7.9% more for their broadband and phone bills in hikes earlier this year.
