Stamping out advertising scams
27 February 2006
The ASA is lending its support to the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) Scams Awareness Campaign to help raise public awareness of the problems with scams. Launched earlier this year, the campaign involves a four-week-long initiative to help educate people how to recognise the general characteristics of scams and how to avoid falling victim to them.
The ASA has provided information on its website to highlight some of the advertising scams that are detrimental to consumers. In particular, the ASA will focus on psychic mailings, a central topic on the OFT’s agenda during the campaign. The ASA receives many complaints about unsolicited mailings that arrive through people’s doors promising, among other things, to help recipients find fortune and love or to cure various ailments, lift curses and bad luck. Those dubious promises can leave vulnerable consumers out of pocket and disappointed, having paid for something that never materialises. The ASA will underline the problems of scams and how best to deal with the offending material.
The OFT campaign is not just for the benefit of consumers: the advertising industry also stands to gain from increased consumer awareness of scams. Unscrupulous businesses that profit through deceptive advertising bring the industry into disrepute and undermine consumer confidence. Underhand and deliberate breaches of the advertising code by rogue operators go against the letter and spirit of effective self-regulation.
If, as a result of the campaign, consumers can more easily recognise scams, it will encourage them to adopt a more pro-active role in stamping out fraudulent practices. That in turn will serve to bolster consumer confidence in advertising that is legal, decent, honest and truthful and will underline the fact that the vast proportion of advertising in the UK is prepared in the best interests of consumers and society.
Scams can often be sophisticated and those who least expect to fall for them can find themselves parted from their money. Mass-marketed scams affect a large number of people and a key objective is to demystify the concept that only certain types of people fall for scams. You do not have to be gullible or vulnerable to become a victim; there is a scam for everyone.
The ASA and CAP support the continuing drive to raise consumer awareness about scams, to combat the concept that people who fall victim to false promises are in some way greedy or gullible and to firmly shift the emphasis of blame where it should be – onto those who are behind the scams. The advertising industry should take a vested interest in this campaign. Gaining consumer confidence is crucial if advertisers are to effectively reach their audience. Advertising scams erode consumer trust and damage the integrity of the industry as a whole.