Vodafone has been told by the Advertising Standards Agency that adverts for its Mobile Broadband service are misleading, and must be changed. The ruling follows complaints by rival ISPs 3 and T-Mobile over two national press adverts which claimed that the service, costing £15 a month, was the “fastest, most reliable mobile broadband in the galaxy”.
Additional advertising copy reads “Leap into hyperdrive. With Vodafone’s mobile broadband you get download speeds of up to 7.2Mbps on your laptop, which is as quick as most home broadband… enjoy mobile broadband that’s light years ahead.”
Unsurprisingly, Vodafone’s rivals were a little peeved at these claims, and lodged a complaint with the ASA, asserting that the mobile giant’s claim that it offers the “fastest” and “most reliable” broadband that is “light years ahead” of its competitors was inaccurate. Vodafone had based its evidence on independent speed trials conducted by the LLC.
The ASA ruled that Vodafone had neglected to make clear on its advertising the basis for its claims, and that the public therefore did not have enough evidence to make an informed decision. It noted that tests within homes were not included in the LLC data, and that in six of the ten UK regions where Vodafone’s mobile broadband service was trialled, webpages downloaded faster through another network.
“We concluded that, because readers would understand it was based on both the speed and reliability of the Vodafone service”, said the ASA in a statement. “Because we had not seen evidence to support those claims, the claim ‘mobile broadband that’s light years ahead’ was misleading.”
The ASA has decided to uphold all three complaints, and has told Vodafone to remove the ads in question, and to be more transparent in future advertising.
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