A BT advert has recently been banned for misleading customers over broadband speeds.
In the TV advert, a voice-over said BT is “rolling out up to 20 meg speeds” to give “consistently faster broadband”. The Advertising Standards Authority said it had not seen sufficient evidence to support the claim and concluded that the advert was likely to mislead.
The advert – an instalment in an ongoing campaign about “Adam and Jane” – showed Adam being shown around a property by an estate agent as he talked to his partner, Jane, on his mobile. She was seen viewing the house online from her home computer, loading a website faster than the estate agent at peak time.
There were several complaints from the public and broadband competitors. Some felt the 20Mb (megabits per second) claim was misleading and could not be substantiated.
Others believed surfing a typical website would not be any faster with a 20Mb service than it would with BT’s original 8Mb service.
In reaching its decision, the ASA said: “Because we had not seen sufficient evidence to support the claim that BT’s new broadband service was consistently faster than its existing 8Mb service even at peak times, we concluded that the ad was likely to mislead.”