The Advertising Standards Authority has upheld a complaint that ASDA's advert was misleading because it was highlighting the benefits to consumers of its 100 day guarantee. It was misleading because consumers had up to six years at law to make a complaint if a product did not comply with statutory rights under the Sale of Goods Act to be of satisfactory quality. Whether or not clothes should last six years is another matter, because the Act says that the products should only have to last as long as they are expected to last (rather than six years). In any event, though, the onus is on the seller in the first six months after purchase to prove that the goods were of satisfactory quality when they were purchased.
The ASA acknowledged that ASDA applied the 100 day guarantee to the goods whether they were faulty or not and therefore this did go beyond the consumer's rights at law for non-faulty goods, but this had not been made clear from the advert. Accordingly, ASDA had breached the Broadcasting Code of Practice and was ordered not to repeat the ad in that form.
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