Comply with advertising standards

Introduction

Nearly every business advertises at some stage - but whichever media you choose, the claims you make for your product or service must comply with a number of regulations. This also applies to direct marketing mailshots.

The regulations are, for the most part, very simple. As long as your advertisement is legal, decent, truthful and honest, you usually won't have anything to worry about.

Two Committees of Advertising Practice, one for broadcast advertising, the other for non-broadcast advertising, are responsible for drawing up codes of practice - CAP Codes. This guide outlines how these codes and various laws affect your business. It also explains how to avoid breaching any regulations and covers what happens if your advertising is the subject of a complaint.

Subjects covered in this guide

• Introduction
• How advertising standards are regulated
• The CAP Codes
• How to comply with the CAP Codes
• Handling CAP Codes complaints
• Online promotions and advertisements

Print options - What are my print options - Opens in a new window

• Add guide to my print portfolio (print later as PDF)

Email options - What are my email options - Opens in a new window

• Tell a friend about this page
• Send me an email alert when this guide changes