Broadband ads are confusing and misleading

People in the UK are confused by broadband advertising that can make it difficult to determine the best deals. The charity Citizens Advice says that most people find the ads too confusing and felt overwhelmed with information, making the task of comparing packages that much harder.

CA's findings suggest that more than half of people looking at broadband deals could not identify the cheapest deal available to them, at least in part because line rental costs were not always made clear. ISPs are accused of misleading customers, using headline-grabbing deal prices that do not truly reflect what the costs are.

These are familiar accusations that have previously been levelled at credit card companies, and the real concern is that people are simply not provided with the information they need to make an informed decision. The charity's research involved asking groups of people to calculate the cost of a given broadband deal, and to calculate which was the cheapest of two samples.

An astonishing 56 percent of people couldn’t work out what the deals would cost (although it's probably worth factoring in the mathematical abilities that some may or may not possess). In one case, just 22 percent of those questioned could determine the cost of a deal from a company which Citizens Advice has not identified.

Citizens Advice's chief executive, Gillian Guy said:

Attractive headline offers that don't include line rental costs make it impossible for people to work out the best broadband deal on offer without doing complicated sums. Broadband providers need to make the costs of a contract clear in their advertising and the Advertising Standards Authority should also review the code of practice to make sure it works well for consumers.

Singled out for criticism was the practice of highlighting the cost of a promotional period without making it clear how costs would jump when this came to an end.

Early in 2016, a joint report by the Advertising Standards Authority and Ofcom is due to be published looking at the broadband advertising landscape.

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