PRESS RELEASE – ASAI Annual Report 2014

At the 34th Annual General Meeting of the Advertising Standards Authority for Ireland (ASAI) held today, Mr. Sean O’Meara, Chairman, in his statement in the Annual Report presented at the meeting, referred to the mix of tasks being undertaken in 2014 with work continuing on the review of the Code and research being conducted with stakeholders in order to complete a strategic review of the organisation. 

The Chairman also referred to the breadth of experience available to the ASAI from the varied membership of the Board with their respective professional skills.

For full details on the report please click here: 2014 Annual Report

In her section of the Report, the Chairperson of the Complaints Committee referred to the wealth of skills available to the Committee in considering and deciding on individual complaints.

The ASAI resolved 1,384 formal complaints in 2014.  This resulted in 92 advertisements being found to be in breach of the ASAI Code by the independent Complaints Committee.  In 2014, as in other years, the principal reason advertisements were found to be in breach of the Code was that they were considered to be misleading.  64 percent of the complaints made were on the basis that an advertisement was misleading with almost 24 percent made on the basis that an advertisement was offensive.  There are a wide range of other issues covered by the Code provisions that were raised by members of the public, including concerns about alcohol advertising, children, employment and business opportunities, financial services, food and non-alcoholic beverages, health and beauty claims and slimming claims.

In relation to the media in which the advertisements complained of appeared, once again digital media formed the largest group at 606 complaints.  Complaints relating to broadcast media (TV and radio combined) were at 450.

Details of complaints for the significant sectoral groups are provided at the end of this release and in greater detail in the report.  The number of complaints received at 1,394 shows a small increase over the figure of 1,302 received in 2013.

In relation to monitoring, the ASAI reported that since 2007 they had reviewed 27,000 advertisements across all media, involving all areas of economic activity, as part of their structured monitoring programme.  The results of this exercise showed an overall compliance level of 98 percent.

For further information contact:

ASAI –  Tel: 01 613 7040.

The Advertising Standards Authority for Ireland (ASAI) is the self-regulatory body set up by the advertising industry, including advertisers, agencies and media companies, to promote the highest standards of commercial advertising and to enforce the Code of Standards for Advertising, Promotional and Direct Marketing in Ireland, full details of which are available on ASAI’s website at www.asai.ie.

Case Reports on adjudications of the independent Complaints Committee of the ASAI are released in periodic Complaints Bulletins during the year and are also posted on the ASAI website.

Complaints by Sector

A copy of our Annual Report is available on our website:  www.asai.ie