BSkyB Lands in Trouble with the ASA over Broadband Speed Ad
A print ad released by BSkyB, which takes on its competitors Virgin Media and BT, was found to be inaccurate and was banned by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA). The advertisement was a direct comparison and took a shot at the broadband speeds of BSkyB’s rivals.
The print ad clearly claimed that if a subscriber is in a Sky network area, he or she would not have to face slow broadband speeds, unlike BT or Virgin Media. This was seen as an adverse criticism aimed at BT and Virgin Broadband. In fact, the policy of these companies is to slow down the speeds of only active users during peak times. The ASA accepted the claim of BT and a private subscriber that these enforced slowdowns affect only the most active users, and not all subscribers as implied in the ad.
In its defence, BSkyB claimed that traffic management systems of the providers ensured that slow broadband speeds could theoretically apply to all BT and Virgin customers, including those using low bandwidths.
The ASA accepted that the companies mentioned in the ad do have such traffic management measures, but also supported the viewpoint that these throttling measures applied only to a small portion of the subscriber base of these two companies, unlike the ad, which suggested that even those with low bandwidth needs are affected. Therefore, the ASA ordered the ad to be banned.
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