The ASA turned up the heat against the Red Miracle Group for a Domino’s promotion the franchisee ran last week by upholding a ruling against the company for unfairly administering a promotion and causing participants unnecessary disappointment.  

What was the Ad?  

A Domino’s leaflet seen in February 2023 stated “HOW TO CLAIM YOUR FREE PIZZA” and directed entrants to “SCAN QR CODE TO OPEN/DOWNLOAD THE APP. PICK YOUR FREE MEDIUM PIZZA. ENTER CODE AT CHECKOUT”. A QR code was included on the leaflet as well as a unique code for each leaflet.  

What got entrants PIZZA-ed off?  

Several entrants tried to redeem the promotion but were told it had been withdrawn. As such, these entrants challenged whether the promotion had been administered fairly.  

Red Miracle Group’s response: 

• RMG argued that when they had previously run the same promotion using leaflets in the past, the uptake had been much lower. For this reason, RMG distributed almost doubled the number of leaflets which led to a tenfold increase in the redemption rate.  
• RMG believed the larger redemption rate was brought about by the abuse of the promotion, in particular, local stores had reported the same people were redeeming the promotion in-store, even though the promotional terms stipulated that there was one voucher to be distributed per household.  
• RMG used this to justify withdrawing the offer to prevent further abuse of the promotion.  

• RMG said their response was necessary to ensure stores were not overwhelmed by orders from the promotion and they highlighted a clause in the Terms on the leaflet which allowed them to “update, amend or withdraw the offer at any time”.  
• RMG said they attempted to mitigate the participants’ disappointment by offering a 60% discount across all pizzas, sides and desserts to those who attempted to redeem the code and could not.  

The ASA upheld their ruling against RMG for the following reasons:  

• Promoters must conduct their promotions equitably, promptly and efficiently and be seen to deal fairly and honourably with participants, they must avoid causing unnecessary disappointment. Phrases such as “subject to availability” did not relieve promoters from their obligation to do everything reasonable to avoid disappointing participants.  

• Withdrawing the promotion because certain participants redeemed multiple leaflets was not consistent with the Promotional Terms. The Terms had no cap on the number of households the offer was limited to nor on the number of pizzas that could be claimed. As such, there was no breach by the participants using multiple vouchers.  

• Participants who had not had a chance to redeem their vouchers were dealt with unfairly when the promotion was withdrawn.  
• The 60% discount offered to participants who could no longer redeem the offer was not equivalent to offering a free pizza, even though the discount code could have resulted in better savings for consumers. All reasonable steps were not taken to avoid disappointing participants.  

• Marketing communications must not describe a product as “free” if a consumer has to pay anything other than the unavoidable cost of responding, collecting or delivering the item.  

• A minimum spend was required to obtain the free medium pizza, this was in breach of the Code.  

RMG and Domino’s Pizza UK and Ireland were told to ensure any future promotions are administered fairly.  

In brief, this ruling serves as a reminder to: 

• Not describe products as “free” if a minimum spend is required to redeem the offer.  
• If you would like to limit the number of vouchers used by participants we would strongly recommend including a cap of one redemption per person/household.  
• You cannot withdraw a promotion unless circumstances arise which are so exceptional and are outside of the control of the Promoter.  
• When offering an alternative offer, all reasonable steps need to be taken to avoid disappointing participants.  

As promotional bodyguards, PromoVeritas provides compliance advice to ensure promotions run within the confines of the law and regulatory guidance. Feel free to reach out if you would like any advice!