A lettings comparison site has been told that its advertising is in breach of advertising regulations.
Comparelettingagents.co.uk’s website was headed “Find the best letting agents in your area!”.
Smaller text stated “Enter your postcode to find the top agents and save over £500 in agent fees!” and “How it works: 1. Enter your postcode and email – 2. We compare the entire market to find you the best deals – 3. We shortlist the best agents in your area along with their fees and contact details”. Text under the heading “Why use Compare Letting Agents?” included “Free, fair and impartial” and “Data from over 10,000 letting agents in England, Scotland and Wales”. Small print at the bottom of the page stated “Brought to you by Rentify.”
Lets-Rent.co.uk, a letting agent whose details had been included on the website, challenged whether the following claim “fair and impartial” was misleading, because the website was operated by a letting agent whose details appeared in the search results returned through use of the site.
Rentify Ltd said the ratings of the agents on their website were entirely user-sourced and vetted or approved. They said that the reviews of agents were intentionally anonymous and that there were 4,686 star ratings on the website for 16,620 branches. Rentify also said their own five-star rating was based on user reviews. They explained that they appeared in searches for post codes outside of London because they operated nationwide and provided evidence to demonstrate that. They pointed out that the listings were also ordered from lowest to highest price and, therefore, because their service was free, they often appeared at the top of the listings.
The ASA understood that www.comparelettingagents.co.uk was owned by Rentify, a letting agent that appeared in the website’s search listings. It considered consumers would interpret the claim “fair and impartial” to mean that the organisation that ran the website were entirely independent from the lettings industry and had no commercial interest in the ratings of the agents.
While Rentify said the ratings were entirely user-sourced, the ASA noted CAP Code rule 2.3 stated marketers should make clear their commercial intent, if that was not obvious from the context. While the ASA noted text at the bottom of the page stated “Brought to you by Rentify”, it considered the impression a consumer would get from the claim “fair and impartial” contradicted that fact.
The ASA believed that by choosing how the agents were ordered in the search listings, Rentify were benefiting by appearing at the top and we had not seen sufficient evidence to demonstrate that Rentify’s five-star rating was based on user reviews. Because the claim implied Rentify were independent from the industry and had no commercial interest in the listings, which was not the case, the ASA concluded the ad was misleading, breaching CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 2.3 (Recognition of marketing communications), 3.1 and 3.3 (Misleading advertising) and 3.7 (Substantiation).
The ad must not appear in its current form. The ASA told Rentify Ltd to ensure that marketing communications made their commercial intent sufficiently clear and did not misleadingly imply they were independent from the letting agent industry.