Dell Corporation Ltd Dell House The Boulevard Cain Road Bracknell Berkshire RG12 1LF Number of complaints: 1

Date: 15 October 2008 Media: Internet (sales promotion) Sector: Computers and telecommunications Agency: GCI Group

Ad
An online sales promotion for an Inspiron 1720 laptop.  Text stated "Price £749.00  You save £150  Total £599.00".  A specification below showed the laptop did not include Bluetooth.

Issue
The complainant challenged whether the was price for the laptop was genuine, because he believed the product previously advertised for £749 included Bluetooth.

The CAP Code:

3.1;7.1;27.4;15.5

Response
Dell Corporation Ltd (Dell) said the promotion was a special one day offer with the objective of measuring the success of the offer on that day; they had created a new E-Value code (a unique number, which related to bundles of products for sale together) to enable them to take this measurement.  They said it was intended that the laptop on offer for £599 would be of exactly the same specification as the model sold at a was price of £749, with the only difference being the price.  They said they sometimes increased the components in a bundle as a result of incremental offers but never decreased them.

Dell said new bundles and their respective E-Value codes were created manually and in this case, as the result of an administrative error on the part of their staff, the new £599 bundle did not include Bluetooth.  They said the model sold at £749 did include Bluetooth and they were investigating how the error had occurred; they no longer intended to use E-Value code creation exercises to ensure there were no similar errors.  Dell said the ad would not appear in the future although they may use one-day special offers again.

Assessment
Upheld
The ASA noted Dell had intended the laptop on offer at £599 to be of the same specification as the model sold at the was price and that the omission of the Bluetooth component had been the result of an administrative error.

Nevertheless, we considered the ad was misleading because the was price related to a higher specification product than the model on offer for £599.

The ad breached CAP Code clauses 3.1 (Substantiation), 7.1 (Truthfulness), 15.5 (Price comparisons) and 27.4 (Unnecessary disappointment).

Action
The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told Dell not to refer to was prices unless they could show that the product 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)