A complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) about a radio promotion for free cinema tickets has been upheld against Universal Pictures (UK) Ltd.

A radio ad was broadcast offering a “free kid ticket in every pack for the new movie…”. The packs showed that vouchers would only be valid at one cinema chain. The complaining listener lived in an area where there were no cinemas from that chain. The ASA considered that listeners where likely to assume that the offer would apply to a cinema within the transmission area – not approximately 50 miles away, and therefore the advert was misleading.

The advert was found to breach the CAP (Broadcast) Radio Advertising Standards Code, and the advertiser was warned to take extra care with similar ads.

Moral of the story: check the contents of each advert for each region.