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ASA bans 'misleading' Virgin Media broadband ad
Marketing News |
29/06/2012
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has forced broadband, phone and TV provider Virgin Media to pull another advertising campaign.
For the third time this year, the industry regulator has upheld complaints about the firm's marketing material.
This time, rival firm Sky and members of the public raised objections to the wording of its broadband 'speed doubling adverts', which feature Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt.
In the ads, the Olympic 100m champion assumed the guise of Virgin founder Sir Richard Branson, even sporting a blonde goatee beard.
The adverts may have proved popular with consumers, but the ASA took a dim view of Virgin Media's claim that it is "doubling everyone's speeds" in an ongoing network upgrade.
Some four million subscribers are set to receive download capabilities twice those they signed up for, however only consumers on the firm's 10Mbps, 20Mbps, 30Mbps and 50Mbps tariffs are to gain double speeds.
Fibre broadband customers already signed up to the firm's 100Mbps deal are receiving an upgrade to 120Mbps, the fastest speeds currently available to Virgin Media customers.
The company accepted that the wording of its advert could potentially be misinterpreted by some subscribers.
"We've proactively communicated details of the 100Mbps speed boost, and accompanying reduction in the monthly subscription, to all our customers directly and within this online ad," a spokesperson for the service provider stated.
"But we will make sure that we're even clearer about how we're bringing some of the UK's fastest broadband to Virgin Media customers."
Back in April, the ASA sanctioned Virgin Media because the small print in its adverts was almost impossible to read.
And in May, the firm attracted the attentions of the regulator for failing to include the cost of line rental in the headline price of a broadband package.
Posted by Stephen Wilkinson
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