Advertising and broadcasting standards

How do you go about complaining about an advertisement?

The Advertising Standards Authority

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) is funded by the advertising and media industries, and has the stated purpose of ensuring that advertising is socially responsible and truthful.

It's a voluntary body, but all the major media representatives belong, including Television New Zealand, TV3, Radio New Zealand, the Newspaper Publishers' Association, the Magazine Publishers Association and the Cinema Advertisers Council.

The ASA administers the Advertising Standards Complaints Board (ASCB), which is the body that hears complaints about ads, and the Advertising Standards Complaints Appeal Board (ASCAB).

How the system works

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has considerable clout. If a complaint is upheld by the board, the advertiser is requested to immediately withdraw the advert. The media is also requested to cease the publication or broadcasting of the advert. These requests are invariably complied with.

Most complaints to the ASA come from the general public. There is no fee for the public to do this. Companies can also complain about their rivals' advertisements, but they may have to pay a fee.

The Advertising Standards Complaints Board (ASCB) comprises eight members, four drawn from the advertising industry and four (including the chairperson) from the general public. The chairperson also has a casting vote. An expert panel will be convened to hear complaints about competitor's ads.

The ASCB will hear complaints about ads even when the organisation that run the ads are not members of the ASA. It passes its decision to the offenders and asks them to comply.

The ASCB's decisions can in some circumstances be appealed to the Advertising Standards Complaints Appeal Board (ASCAB). The ASCAB is made up of one industry representative and two members of the general public, one of whom is chairperson.

The Advertising Standards Authority Codes of Practice

The ASA has a series of codes of practice to which its members must adhere. The Advertising Standards Complaints Board (ASCB) will only hear complaints that an advertisement has breached one or more of these codes. The basic one is the code of ethics. Among other things, it states that advertisements must be clearly identifiable as such, must be truthful, decent, maintain people privacy and should not encourage a disregard for safety.

There are also codes dealing with specific product types, including advertisements about liquor, therapeutic treatments, road safety, financial advertising, tobacco and environmental claims. New codes are developed from time to time.

How to complain

Complaints can be made in writing or submitted online through the ASA website.

Where the complaint involves a print advertisement, a copy of the ad should be included. With a TV or radio ad, the approximate time, date and broadcast channel/station should be mentioned. If you take a complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority you cannot also take the matter to another forum.

You don't have to know the codes to complain. The ASA itself will work out which rule the ad may have broken, send you a copy of the code and its view of how it applies, and ask whether you agree.

The chairperson of the Advertising Standards Complaints Board (ASCB) will make an initial review of the complaint and decide whether it should proceed. If a complaint is not accepted, the complainant can in some circumstances appeal this decision to the Advertising Standards Complaints Appeal Board (ASCAB).

When a complaint is heard by the ASCB, all parties are given a chance to comment. As part of this consultation process, the ASCB gives the advertiser, the advertising agency and the organisation that ran the ad the name and address of the complainant.

Once it has heard from all sides, the ASCB will make its ruling and a written decision will be circulated. Only once has an advertiser not accepted a final ruling. Back in 1991 the Reserve Bank was unmoved when the ASCB ruled the bank's ads contravened the Code of Financial Advertising. But the media refused to run the offending ads and the Reserve Bank was forced to change them.

The ASCB reviews all complaints on their merits, and says it is not influenced by the number of times an ad is complained about.

Advertising not covered

Some advertising is beyond the Advertising Standards Authority's control, for example overseas magazines. The ASA is developing stronger links with similar organisations overseas, but there will probably always be some lack of agreement and lack of coverage. Maintaining and enforcing standards for ads on the Internet will be even more difficult.

Another problem is overseas TV ads. There have been complaints about ads broadcast by Sky during live broadcasts. Sky does not belong to the ASA and says it couldn't always stop ads being broadcast during live telecasts from overseas. This is because Sky doesn't always know when specific ads will be played.

Other ways to complain

The Advertising Standards Complaints Board (ASCB) isn't always the best forum for an advertising complaint.

The Commerce Commission enforces the Fair Trading Act which deals with misleading and deceptive conduct by traders. If an advertiser breaches the Fair Trading Act the Commerce Commission may prosecute the matter in court. A trader can face a fine of up to $200,000 per offence. It is important to note, however, that the Commission is only able to investigate a small proportion of the complaints it receives.

If you want something done in a big hurry, it's sometimes better to go direct to the advertiser or the media. When writing to the advertiser, point our where you think the ad has failed or is in poor taste.

Broadcasting standards

If you want to complain about programme standards on radio or TV (or political advertising in these media), the appropriate body is the Broadcasting Standards Authority (BSA). This is a government regulatory body which has developed a number of codes of practice.

For example, the code covering free-to-air TV programmes states that such programmes must be truthful and accurate, deal justly and fairly with any person taking part or referred to in any programme and show balance and impartiality in dealing with political matters, current affairs and all questions of a controversial nature.

The BSA only hears complaints that a specific code has been breached. All of the codes can be ordered from the BSA. Individual codes are usually available free of charge.

Complaints must be in writing and be sent to the broadcaster first, within 20 working days of the broadcast. If you are dissatisfied with the broadcaster's response you can refer your complaint to the BSA. 

More information

• Fair Trading Act
• Advertising Standards Complaints Board
  For free copies of the ASA codes and a booklet on how to complain.
• Broadcasting Standards Authority
• Commerce Commission
• Human Rights Commission