Everest Ltd Sopers Road Cuffley Potters Bar Hertfordshire EN6 4SG Number of complaints: 1

Date: 15 October 2008 Media: Television Sector: Household

Ad
A TV ad for Everest showed a pub in a hilly area, with stormy weather conditions and significant wind noise.  As the presenter walked around the pub, he stated "Over 20 years ago, Everest famously replaced the windows here at Tan Hill. Today they are back to upgrade them to the new A-rated energy efficiency versions.  Keeping valuable heat in."  Engineers were shown working on the pubs exterior and the presenter continued "and they are also fitting their new solar panels which will generate the pubs hot water for years to come.

Issue
One viewer challenged whether the ad was misleading because it implied solar panels could provide all of a property's hot water, whereas the advertisers website stated that solar panels provided 50-70% of a property's hot water and had to be complemented by other heating methods.

BCAP TV Advertising Code:

5.1;5.2.1;5.2.2

Response
Everest Ltd (Everest) said they intended to communicate the durability and longevity of the solar panels, as opposed to the specific volume of hot water delivered and outlined that Everest solar panels had a life span of 10 years or more.  They said they did not intend to mislead viewers and pointed out they deliberately did not specify the amount of hot water which could be produced, nor refer to "all" the water.  They felt viewers would understand that solar panels cannot provide all the hot water required by a property all the time.  They said they considered it reasonable to assume that viewers would know that solar panels were powered by sunlight, that UK weather and the amount of sunlight on any given day were variable, and that there was not continuous 24-hour daylight.  On this basis, they considered that viewers would not assume the solar panels installed at the pub might provide all the hot water for the pub, because this would be an assumption which defied common sense.  They said the claim on the website that Everest solar panels supplied between 50% and 70% of a property's yearly hot water requirements was a statistic from an independent body and related to the average amount of hot water that standard solar panels might reasonably be expected to produce for an average household over a whole year.  Everest said they expected their solar panels to perform better than this, but did not make that claim.

Clearcast said the claim regarding the solar panels concerned their longevity, rather than the volume of hot water they could supply and was not specific about the volume of hot water the panels could supply.  They therefore felt that the ad was not misleading.

Assessment
Upheld
The ASA acknowledged that Everest had intended the claim to refer to the longevity of the solar panels, rather than the volume of hot water generated, and that the claim in the ad did not state "all" the water could be generated by the solar panels.

However, the ASA noted that the Everest website stated solar panels could provide 50% and 70% of hot water, which referred to the volume of water the solar panels might generate, whereas the ad claimed that the solar panels would "generate the pub's hot water for years to come".  We considered some viewers might understand that Everest's claim that the new solar panels will generate the pub's hot water for years to come" referred to the volume of hot water generated, as well as the panels' longevity.  Because the claim was ambiguous, we considered the ad could mislead.

The ad breached CAP (Broadcast) TV Advertising Standards Code rules 5.1 (Misleading advertising), 5.2 (Claims) and 5.2.2 (Implications).

Action
The ad should not be broadcast again in its present form.

Adjudication of the ASA Council (Broadcast)