Complaints to ASA about agents’ misleading advertisements

The Advertising Standards Authority has informally resolved a case in which a complainant challenged whether a website ad for Yopa was misleading.

The complainant challenged whether the ad was misleading because it stated:

“You’ll only pay one fee, and it’s fixed from the beginning. There are no surprises, and we never add commission” and “choose to pay our fair fixed fee only when your home is sold” but failed to mention that if the property is not sold the fee will be taken at 10 months.

The advertiser provided assurance that they would amend the ad to include a suitable qualification clarifying that the fee will need to be paid within 10 months even if the property has not been sold.

The ASA also received a complaint about Purplebricks claiming that it sold properties for £8,000 more on average than the top five agency brands and that it sold homes more rapidly than them.

The complaints queried the accuracy of these claims and whether they could substantiated.

Purplebricks agreed to remove the claims, and the matter was resolved informally.

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4 Comments

  1. haveathink

    When is there going to be proper sanctions in place.   Not the first time either of these companies (in my book neither are estate agents) have been brought to task.

     

    I’ve just been through a very painful process in trying to book a viewing through PB so i am confident they are not going to last.

     

    Yopa seem very keen to facilitate mortgage leads – there could be questions asked if they truly are getting the best price for their vendor or are more concerned with the mortgage lead.

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  2. M Barnard

    6 formal rulings and 12 informal resolutions with the ASA now for Purplebricks.

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  3. Typhoon

    “The  jury will disregard that remark”. Of course they never do and both PB and Yopa (is that a yogurt?) have had their ad out there and probably none of the public that have seen these adverts will ever know that the ASA ordered a change

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  4. Evolve

    where did the data come from

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