South Africa’s mobile-data-only network, Rain has been forced by the country’s Advertising Regulatory Board (ARB) to make adjustments to its advertising after customers complained that it 5G advert was misleading.
My BroadBand reports that Rain’s unlimited home 5G product specified that it offers “Download speeds up to 25Mbps” and “HD (720 pixel) video streaming”. But customers said they have been experiencing something different.
According to customers, Rain’s product can’t deliver streaming video at resolutions higher than 480 pixels. The complaints made the ARB consider Rain’s advertisement as “misleading”.
The ARB reached out to Rain to clarify the issue, and Rain stood by its advertising, claiming that it can in fact reach 720p resolutions.
The regulator however disagreed with Rain and offered a simple solution that removes ambiguity: adding “up to 720p” to its terms, which means consumers should understand any decreased resolution.
So far, Rain has confirmed that it has taken up the ARB’s recommendations and will be removing all forms of ambiguity in future ads.
Ghana
This kind of misleading advertising was very common among telcos in Ghana, particularly with data speeds.
But yours truly exposed them, based on numerous expert information that the kind of data speeds the telcos claimed was only possible under highly control environment, which does not exist and can never exist in the real world.
The telcos were very much aware that their claims were not realistic and yet for mere competitive edge, with blatant disregard for consumer interest, they kept making the claims until they were exposed in a series of articles years back.
