A company which charges consumers up to £40 a year to block unsolicited phone calls has been censored by the Advertising Standards Authority, after it ruled an online ad attempted to ape the official Telephone Preference Service, which is free.
A Google sponsored search ad on July 1 2011, stated “Stop Unwanted Phone Calls Telephone Preference Register Apply Now To Stop Nuisance Calls www.telephonepreference.org.uk”.
But one complainant challenged whether the ad was misleading, because she believed it implied it was the official scheme.
But the Telephone Preference Register (TPR) maintained that, although it is similarly named to the Telephone Preference Service, it is not in breach of any trademark or copyright, and has devoted a section of its website to differentiating the TPR from the TPS.
TPR claimed no one had requested a refund but if someone had mistakenly signed up for the service they would not hesitate in providing a refund.
But while the ASA acknowledged that the TPR website contained a FAQ page that outlined how the service was different from the TPS, it noted the URL of the website was www.telephonepreference.org.uk and titled “Telephone Preference Register, your one-stop site for preventing unsolicited calls”.
The watchdog considered that the similarity of the name and URL of the service to the TPS, and the claim that the site could stop all unsolicited calls, could lead users to infer it was the official Government service.
It ruled the ad was misleading and must not appear in its current form again.
