Advertising board rains down on service provider
The operator of SA’s first 5G network has been instructed to stop saying it offers high download speeds or that its unlimited data is continuously available.
Rain, which expanded to Cape Town on Saturday after launching its 5G network in Gauteng in September, was taken to task by the advertising watchdog after a customer complained that his data connection repeatedly failed.
Suvasin Moodley said an online Rain ad was also misleading because it promoted a choice of internet speeds, when in his experience the variability was so great it was impossible even to conduct a speed test.
Similarly, it mentioned a choice of streaming quality, but the connection was so poor that effectively there was no choice.
Moodley also complained about a second Rain ad promoting “average network download speeds over 200 megabits per second”. He said this was impossible to verify because “the network drops completely and there is no stability throughout the day”.
The ad’s claim of “unlimited 24/7 home wifi” was also untrue, he said, because the network failed so often that it was “unusable” for streaming or working online.
In its response to the Advertising Regulatory Board (ARB), Rain said the unlimited data offer was true because its 5G plans did not charge for every gigabyte downloaded.
It said its offer of a choice of network speeds was also true.
“There are two different 5G plans: Unlimited Home 5G Standard with speeds of up to 30Mbps and Unlimited Home 5G Premium with the average network download speeds of 200Mbps,” it said.
The first plan offered standard high-definition (HD) video streaming, while the second came with full HD and multiple HD streams.
Rain told the watchdog that when a customer signed up, but experienced poor coverage, a refund was available.
“The ARB requested a further response and substantiation from [Rain] in respect of its claims, but the advertiser failed to respond,” the board’s finding said.
It said it didn’t require an internet service provider to meet promised standards “in every single unique situation, but it does require proof that the advertiser is generally capable of meeting the advertised claims”.
“[Rain] did not provide substantiation to support the speed or quality claims. More specifically, there is nothing to show [it] actually offers the claimed performance,” said the board, finding Rain had breached the advertising code’s regulations on substantiation.
The claim of “unlimited data 24/7” was ambiguous because it could relate to the billing method or availability. It was therefore misleading, the board decided.
It instructed Rain to stop using ads containing its unsubstantiated or misleading claims.