Ad description
A website for Holiday Extras, www.holidayextras.com, seen on 3 March 2023, featured a webpage with listings for parking at Stansted Airport. Within each listing, a text box “Flextras: Free Cancellation” linked through to a pop-up box with text stating “FLEXTRAS: FREE CANCELLATION is our most flexible option. You can amend or cancel your booking up to your booked arrival time, without any fees” and a blue link which stated “More information”. This further linked to a pop-up box with additional information with text stating, “Cancellations within 7 days of making your booking will be issued as a voucher for the full amount. You can cancel your voucher and request a cash refund within 14 days of issue. Cancellations 7 days or more after making your booking, will be issued a voucher for the full amount. You can cancel your voucher and request a cash refund (less £10 which we’ll save to your account to use on your next booking) within 14 days of issue. You can cancel your booking for a voucher right up to your booked arrival date and time. We are unable to issue a cash refund for bookings cancelled on the arrival date”.
Issue
The complainant challenged whether the claim “Free Cancellation” was misleading.Response
Holiday Extras Ltd said that, because the circumstances in which £10 was retained as a voucher were infrequent, they considered it was fair and reasonable for that information to appear in the terms and conditions. They said that 9.74% of their cancellations had been affected by that provision, and that it was implemented as a safeguard against a small number of customers making a large number of bookings and then cancelling at the last minute, which they said would be of considerable detriment to their customers. They also said that to explain the voucher provision on the first page of booking would cause more confusion than benefit.Assessment
Upheld
The ad stated, “Flextras: Free Cancellation” and “FLEXTRAS: FREE CANCELLATION is our most flexible option. You can amend or cancel your booking up to your booked arrival time, without any fees”. The ASA considered consumers would understand from those claims that that they would be able to cancel or amend a booking until their booked arrival time without incurring a financial penalty, and for any cancellation they would be refunded in full.
We understood that within further information, refunds were initially issued as a voucher which could be used for Holiday Extras purchases, or which could be exchanged for a cash refund within 14 days of issue. If the booking was cancelled seven days or more after making a booking, £10 of the total would be retained by Holiday Extras as a non-refundable balance on a customer’s account for use against a future booking. In addition, bookings cancelled on the date of arrival would not be eligible for a cash refund.
We considered that those terms were information that would be material, that consumers would need to make an informed decision , and should have been stated clearly and prominently in the ad.
Furthermore, we also considered that retaining £10 (or the full amount when a booking was cancelled on the day) as a voucher amounted to an incurred cost, and therefore it was not the case that consumers could cancel a booking up to their booked arrival time without penalty.
While we acknowledged that the terms were provided within the link ‘more information’, we considered that was not sufficient to override the overall impression the ad gave.
For those reasons we concluded the ad was misleading.
The ad breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 3.1 and 3.3 (Misleading advertising) and 3.9 (Qualifications).
Action
The ad must not appear in the form complained of. We told Holiday Extras to ensure their advertising did not mislead about booking cancellations, and included material information clearly and prominently.
