Ad description
A paid-for TikTok post by TrendyBuzz, seen on 28 June 2022, featured a video of a young woman holding a credit card in her hand while she said, “I just got my credit card and you better believe I’m getting ready to go shopping right after this. But if you guys are worried that you’re not gonna [sic] get accepted for a credit card because you don’t have good credit, don’t worry because I got accepted and my credit score isn’t the best. If you wanna [sic] apply for a credit card, just swipe left.” On-screen text stated, “Get a Credit Card With £10,000 Limit (Any Credit)”.
Issue
The ASA challenged whether the ad trivialised using credit to make purchases and was therefore irresponsible.
Response
Trendybuzz did not respond to the ASA’s enquiries.
TikTok said the ad violated their ad policies and was no longer showing on the platform.
Assessment
Upheld
The ASA was concerned by Trendybuzz’s lack of response and apparent disregard for the Code, which was a breach of CAP Code (Edition 12) rule 1.7 1.7 Any unreasonable delay in responding to the ASA's enquiries will normally be considered a breach of the Code. (Unreasonable delay). We reminded them of their responsibility to respond promptly to our enquiries and told them to do so in future.
We acknowledged that the ad spoke generally about using credit and did not advertise a specific credit product. However, we considered the statements, “I just got my credit card and you better believe I’m getting ready to go shopping right after this” and “[I]f you guys are worried that you’re not going to get accepted for a credit card because you don’t have good credit, don’t worry because I got accepted and my credit score isn’t the best”, were likely to be understood by consumers to mean that the woman had a poor credit history, but nevertheless was continuing to use credit for non-essential purchases and was not worried about the consequences of obtaining further credit.
We accepted that her obtaining a credit card would be subject to credit checks by the provider and that it was not inherently irresponsible for non-essential items to be paid for on credit. We also understood that there were credit card companies who specialised in assisting those with poor credit ratings to obtain credit. However, we considered the ad suggested that she would be making purchases impulsively and had not given proper consideration to whether or not she would be able to keep up with the card repayments.
We also noted that the on-screen text stated, “Get a Credit Card With £10,000 Limit (Any Credit)”. We considered that a credit limit of £10,000 was a significant amount and that it was irresponsible to encourage that those who had a poor credit rating to apply for a card with that limit for non-essential purchases, when that was unlikely to be suitable for their circumstances.
We therefore considered, that in the context of her poor credit history and the amount of credit on offer, the tone of the ad made light of her decision to apply for a credit card and trivialised her spending on it.
For those reasons we considered the ad trivialised using credit to make purchases. We therefore concluded the ad was irresponsible and breached the Code.
The ad breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rule 1.3 1.3 Marketing communications must be prepared with a sense of responsibility to consumers and to society. (Responsible advertising).
Action
The ad must not appear again in the form complained of. We told Trendybuzz not to portray the decision to use credit in an irresponsible way in their ads in future. We referred the matter to CAP’s Compliance team.
