Groupon cops triple slam from ads authority, blames newbies

Voucher site Groupon has promised not to republish adverts judged by the Advertising Standards Authority to be misleading. The company said that during its exponential growth it had hired hundreds of new staff and the ads in question were written by new starters. The ASA upheld complaints against an email advert which said: " …

[DavCrav]

Well duh

"The ASA upheld complaints against an email advert which said: "Today's deal: £9.80 instead of £24.50 for two people to enjoy fantastic all you can eat Brazilian Rodizio food at ... Save 60%" The regulator ruled the advert failed to make clear that one person had to pay the full price of £24.50 in order for their companion to pay £9.80."

That's not so much misleading as lying. How about:

"£1000 instead of £100000 for fifty brand new Ferraris."

I think you can't blame newbies for this...

[Anonymous Coward]

editor

We need a new phrase for the News of World Editor situation as it applies here too;-

Either the boss was derelict in their duty not to check properly on their staff (particularly if they were new) or they were complicit.

[Jon Press]

I always assumed...

... they were somehow related to the organisations that promise that scantily-clad young women are eager to meet me in my locality. Clearly not, so there go my chances of a substantial discount.

[MMcA]

Test case coming shortly, Groupon is in for a real bollocking

Of course they won't run those ads again. They never run the same advert again anyway - it's a 'daily deal', a one-shot. That's the whole point.

Groupon is under investigation yet again by the ASA for recently promoting Idiot Bands (aka 'Power Bands') as the UK National Deal, with all sorts of lying and misleading claims.*

And this time, the standard meaningless promise of 'we won't run that ad again' will not be accepted. The ASA has realised that Groupon can be effectively immune to it's regulation otherwise - and is not happy.

You heard it here first!

*Google 'PowerBalance Scam' if you are the only Reg reader who needs convincing. After being taken to court, they've publicly admitted it was all lies (well, duh...) and offered full refunds. The copycats are rightly very worried.

[Stephen Tordoff]

Full Complaint

IF you read the full complaint, I actually think that Groupon handled this fairly well. The complaints were rightly upheld, but it doesn't appear that Groupon deliberately set out to mislead people.

[Robert A. Rosenberg]

The ad as worded was not misleading IMO

I know that the offer was supposed to be that if one person paid the standard price of £24.50, then their companion would get their meal for £9.80. The way the ad was worded was that two people would pay not the normal £49 for the two meals but £9.80 each (ie: £19.60) which is, as stated, a 60% savings (from £49). Thus on the face of it there was nothing incorrect with the wording of the offer since the real offer would only be a 30% saving. YES it was not the correct offer but the details as stated were 100% accurate (ie: The savings as stated matched the supposed price as stated).

[irrelevant]

read 'em

I read pretty much all the ASA adjudications - got them on RSS. They make for entertaining reading at times. Unfortunately, all it proves is that the ASA is really quite toothless - the most they seem to be able to do is to tell the offending organisation not to do it again. Compare, say, to Phonepayplus whom regularly fine companies many thousands of pounds.

[Anonymous Coward]

No Such Thing

As a drafting error by new a new member of staff.

There is only such a thing as a checking error by management --- or the admission that management does not exist, The company is damned, either way, not the "new member of staff".

management by excuse does not wash.

[Christopher W]

Idiots in not reading small print shocker

Whodathunkit.

I hereby propose learned scholar and erudite student of the high arts Paris Hilton, because even she knows full well that first impressions can be very misleading