Eurostar misled consumers with £29 fare offer

Eurostar has been reprimanded by advertising watchdogs for a second time in two weeks after advertising fares from London to Paris from £29, even though only ‘a very small’ percentage of seats were available at that price.

Following a complaint from a consumer who was unable to book a seat for £29, the advertising watchdog investigated the offer and found that the fare was not readily available.

In additoin to finding that only a small percentage of seats were avaialble at that price, the Advertising Standards Authority also discovered that the cheap fares were not evenly spread throughout the booking period.

Also, the advert was seen in January but the £29 fares weren’t available for travel for at least six weeks.

Eurostar said that on the date the ad was seen, 5,070 fares from London to Paris priced at £29 were available for travel dates between 6 March and 8 June 2018. Although the proportion was small, the actual quantity of tickets made the nominal availability significant, which in their view amounted to a significant proportion of tickets being available at the ‘from’ price.

However, in its ruling, the ASA said: "The £29 fares made up a very small percentage of one-way tickets from London to Paris in both directions within the relevant booking horizon. We therefore did not consider that a significant proportion of tickets was available at the ‘from’ price and because of that the claim was likely to mislead.

"In addition to the proportion of tickets available at the ‘from’ price, we also considered that to avoid misleading consumers the availability of a product at the ‘from’ price should be spread reasonably evenly across the advertised travel period, unless the ad made clear that was not the case, and marketers should make clear the specific travel period to which an offer related.

"Tickets at the lead-in price were only available for dates at least six weeks ahead of the date of booking. We acknowledged that on most days in the booking horizon, there were multiple £29 tickets available on different train services. However, because the lead-in price tickets were on sale over a 12-week period, there was considerably less availability toward the beginning of the booking window. Therefore, consumers would need to book as far in advance as possible (i.e.18 weeks in advance) in order to have a greater chance of obtaining the £29 fare at their desired dates and times.

"Given that we considered that the tickets were not available at the lead-in price in significant proportions, the lack of information on the period when that price was available and the lack of information indicating that the fares were not reasonably evenly distributed throughout the booking period, we concluded that the ad as it originally appeared was misleading."

Even when Eurostar amended the advert to include the number of tickets available and the travel dates, the Advertising Standards Authority said it did not meet the code of practice as the text wasn’t sufficiently prominent and didn’t include enough information.

As a result, Eurostar was told not to repeat the advert.

"We told Eurostar International to ensure in future that when using ‘from’ price claims that a significant proportion of the advertised fares were available at the lead-in price, unless the specified quantity of tickets was stated," said the ASA.

"In addition, we told them to ensure they made clear the dates when the fares were available and that if lead-in fares were not reasonably evenly distributed throughout the travel period, that this was stated. We also told them to ensure that qualifications were sufficiently prominent."

Last month, Eurostar was rapped by the ASA by using time-limited offers to try to rush customers to book.