E & M E Gill Ltd t/a Gills Cruise Centre First Floor Station Road Lanishen Cardiff CF14 5LT Number of complaints: 1

Date: 1 October 2008 Media: National press Sector: Holidays and travel

Ad
A national press ad, for holidays on P&O Cruises, was headlined "Around the World in 82 nights ... 08 January 2009".  Large text stated "Inside cabin from only £7389pp".  A text box below gave examples of prices for four different cabins,  and included "inside with shower  WAS £14651pp  NOW £7389pp".

Issue
The complainant challenged whether the "was" price was genuine.

The CAP Code:

3.1;7.1;15.5

Response
Gills Cruise Centre provided a table of fares, taken from the P&O Cruises World Voyages brochure, as well as a copy of the conditions that related to those fares.  They said they had confirmed the cruise prices at the time of preparing the ad by using the Amadeus software system, which they said was the industry standard software used to confirm current fares.  They sent a print out that showed the fares produced on the software system for the four cabin types referred to in the ad.
   
They said they had calculated the "was" price of £14,651 for the inside cabin with a shower by adding the P&O full brochure price of £14,369 and a miscellaneous charge of £282.  Gills Cruise Centre said the miscellaneous charge was a fuel surcharge, which was excluded from all advertised tariff prices as stated in the conditions of the P&O brochure.  

They said the "now" price was calculated by applying a "pricebreaker" discount (a discount of up to 45% provided by P&O on early bookings) to the brochure price.    They stated Gills Cruise Centre had applied an additional discount to the "pricebreaker" fare making the net fare for the same inside cabin £7,761, which equated to the advertised £7,389 plus the fuel surcharge of £282.

Assessment
Upheld
The ASA noted the "was" price was based on a maximum brochure price but that Gills Cruise Centre had not sent evidence to show that it had ever been charged.  We also noted the "was" price included a £282 fuel surcharge that may apply at the time of booking but the "now" price excluded the fuel surcharge.  

We considered that readers would infer that the "was" price was one that had previously been charged.  Because Gill Cruise Centre did not provide evidence that the "was" price was a price at which the holiday had been sold, and because it included a fuel surcharge that had not been added to the "now" price, we concluded that the ad was misleading.   

The ad breached CAP Code clauses 3.1 (Substantiation), 7.1 (Truthfulness) and 15.5 (Price comparisons).

Action
The ad must not appear again in its current form.  We asked Gill Cruise Centre not to refer to "was" prices unless they could show that cruises had previously been sold at that price.  We also asked them to ensure that price comparisons were made on the same basis.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Non-broadcast)