Broadband provider, Vodafone, has been prohibited from running an advert for its home broadband service following a complaint by rival provider, Virgin Media.

Vodafone’s branding of a premium broadband offering, targeted specifically at gamers, as being ‘Gigafast Broadband’ provoked complaints from Virgin as it implied the firm was providing speeds of one gigabit per second.

Despite the alleged implication of Vodafone’s branding, the company stated in its ad that the maximum speed available on average was 900 megabits per second. In May last year, new rules introduced by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) required providers to advertise download speeds that are reflective of the average available during peak hours – 8 pm to 10 pm.

Upon initial complaints about the terminology employed by Vodafone, the ASA suggested that most consumers would consider the term ‘Giga’ to signify a “hyperbolic description of speed”. However, the watchdog conceded that a minority of consumers could be fooled into believing the term appropriately reflected the speeds on offer – 1,000Mbps and above.

The ASA also noted that this term could be considered accurate due to the fact that Vodafone’s service was capable of reaching speeds of 1Gbps to a small portion of users (or outside peak hours).

“We considered that because it was clear to all consumers that Vodafone Gigafast referred to a range of packages, one of which was capable of achieving 1Gbps, the claim was unlikely to mislead consumers,” the ASA said.

However, the watchdog took issue with another statement on the same page which read: “Great broadband doesn’t have to cost the earth – enjoy Vodafone Gigafast Broadband speeds for as little as £23 a month.”

The ASA highlighted that only the average 100Mbps package could be purchased for this price, while the average 900Mbps package cost around £48 per month.

“Throughout the page, the price claim ‘from £23’, and variations thereof, was stated,” the watchdog said. “We considered that the repetition of the £23 claim, unmoored from reference to a specific package, created the impression that a service that could achieve speeds of 1Gbps was available for £23,”

“Because it implied that consumers could get a service that offered speeds of 1Gbps for £23 per month, when that was not the case, we concluded that it was likely to mislead,” the ASA added.

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The ruling marks the third upheld complaint about Vodafone’s adverts since September 2018 and follows a ruling in favour of the ASA as part of a dispute with CityFibre over the terminology used to describe full-fibre broadband services.

Vodafone has amended the wording on its website, stating: “Our packages start at £28 per month for new customers purchasing Gigafast Broadband 100.”