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Southall Travel advert rapped by ASA

Southall Travel has been found in breach of Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) rules, after an advert it ran in December 2017 about an Air France flight offer.

The offer, which was displayed on the company’s website was spotted on 3rd December 2017, which stated “Air France Flight Deals Special Offer Economy fr £222, Business fr £749, First fr £2941”. However, a complaint was registered after the advertised economy offer fare was unavailable and was deemed “misleading”.

Southall Travel Ltd provided screenshots of 55 return Air France flights priced at £222 or lower and said the prices were valid at the time the ad was seen. They stated that the offer started in late 2017 and had ended in early 2018. They said that all flight prices and availability emanated from Air France. They said that they were satisfied that advertising the prices as “from £222” was not misleading to consumers because it was described as a “special offer” and as a “from” price, and a large and significant number of flights were available at or below that “from” price. They explained that it was not the case that in order to get the advertised price you had to travel in one seat on a Monday in February as there were a large number of seats available.

ASA ruled that the promotion did not include any qualifications to indicate that the offer was subject to availability, nor did it set out any qualifications as to which flights the fare applied to, for example the applicable travel period or the destinations consumers could fly to (or from) for the advertised price. ASA considered that the ad breached the Code because it did not state the applicable conditions and qualifications which applied to the offer.