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The Snooty Fox hotel in Cornwall has been reprimanded by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) over the use of an AA 4-star logo on its website, despite the hotel not actually having the rating.
According to the ASA, the hotel did not provide “any evidence” that it had received that endorsement, and the AA does not list the hotel on its website or state that it had awarded the property a four star rating. The regulatory body concluded that the ad was “misleading”.
The hotel acknowledged the complaint, but did not submit a substantive response to the ASA’s enquiries – which was in breach of the the firm’s Code of Advertising Practice (CAP). The ASA ruled that the ad must not appear again in the form complained about, and has told the property not to claim or imply that it had received an endorsement if it had not.
In its ruling the ASA said: “We considered that consumers would understand from the inclusion of the AA logo and star rating in the ad that The Snooty Fox had received a four star endorsement from the AA’s hotel rating scheme.”
