It was back in January/February of this year that internet bingo site 888Ladies advertised the Golden Ticket jackpot game on the small screens yet despite a complaint being made back in January it is only today that we see the888Ladies ASA adjudication published. The complaint was upheld and the advert banned in its current format.
The complaint made against the 888Ladies Golden Ticket advert was that the commercials were misleading, something we stated as soon as details of the internet bingo promotion went live, a while before the commercials for this promotion from 888Ladies were shown on television. We felt, as the player who made the complaint did, that the fact that the commercial advertised a £5 million jackpot was misleading. The actual complaint states that “one viewer complained that the ad was misleading because it exaggerated the likely amount of the winnings”. This was certainly true as although you could win £5 million in the game the odds were actually 1 in 25778699578994555700 of winning this amount because you had to win bingo in just 24 calls, the number of squares on a 75 ball bingo board.
The full adjudication, which upheld the complaint and stressed that the advert must not be shown again, is available to view on the Advertising Standards Agency website. However what we have issue with is that despite the complaint being made in January and the 888Ladies Golden Ticket game played in February we are now in MAY and it is only now that the online bingo adverts have been banned. Proof that the wheels of industry don’t turn quickly because the advert was misleading up until the game on 17th February, asking that it doesn’t get shown again in its current format is very “locking the stable AFTER the horse has bolted”.
Round of applause for the ASA for doing now what should have been done back in January!
