Sky escapes Virgin Media ad comparison rap

Satellite broadcaster Sky has been cleared of four out of five complaints made by Virgin Media about an advert comparing the two companies' products.

Virgin Media and two individuals claimed that the advert for Sky's 'See Speak and Surf' package was misleading because it was based on an unfair comparison.

The advert was run in the national and regional press, as direct mail and as a banner on internet sites.

The complaints stated that there was no mention of the additional cost of BT line rental, and that Sky could not claim to have 'better TV' because Virgin Media had more TV channels and at least 1,000 hours of on-demand programmes.

Virgin Media also questioned the reference to 'ntl:Virgin', which it said was likely to confuse readers because no such company exists.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) cleared sky on these four counts. "The ASA noted that Sky had compared the standalone prices for Virgin Media's comparable products with its standard bundle price," the ruling stated.

"We noted that Virgin Media did not have an equivalent bundle package with products that had similar specifications to the Sky products at the time the ad appeared."

The ruling also found that Sky had provided a footnote showing which specific products had been compared and their individual prices.

The ASA said that references to 'ntl:Virgin' were unlikely to confuse customers as they ran shortly after the Virgin Media brand was launched on 8 February.

However, Virgin's claim that the phrase 'instead of short-term offers that shoot up' misleadingly implied that Virgin's prices were short term, and might increase in the future, was upheld.

The ASA told Sky not to refer to competitors' offers as 'short-term' in the future unless it could substantiate that this was the case.

The ASA previously backed Sky following a complaint from BT about an advert offering free UK evening and weekend calls.