Boohoo falls foul of ad watchdog over countdown sales

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Dec 5, 2018

E-tailer Boohoo has run into trouble with Britain’s ad watchdog, the Advertising Standards Authority, which has ruled that its ‘countdown’ sales were misleading.

The ASA’s investigation came after BBC consumer programme Watchdog Live said it ran 14 sales on its website between August and November that featured a countdown clock.

Putting pressure on consumers to buy in this way might have been perfectly acceptable except for the fact that the clocks were reset immediately after the countdown ran out.

The ASA ruled that the tactic was misleading as the sales weren’t genuinely time-limited, although Boohoo claimed the extension of the sale periods had been due to consumer demand.

“Boohoo is breaking rules around sales promotions that we have investigated and ruled against previously, which is why this has been passed straight to our compliance team,” the ASA told Watchdog Live. “Our team will work with the advertiser to ensure they bring their ad into line. In this specific instance, the use of a countdown clock is problematic if it misleadingly implies the offer is time-limited when that is not the case.”

Boohoo said that it’s “never our intention to mislead customers and we take full note of the BBC Watchdog’s inquiry. We are looking into our processes to ensure that further diligence is exercised in relation to future promotions of this nature.”