Ofcom fines radio broadcasters for unfair conduct in a listener competition

Ofcom has today fined 30 local radio stations, which form part of GCap Media's One Network, a total of £1,110,000 for the unfair conduct in a listener competition; Secret Sound.

Taken together, the fines amount to the highest total financial penalty to be imposed for the broadcast of radio content which has been found in breach of the Broadcasting Code.

The radio stations were found in breach of the following rules:

Rule 2.11 of the Ofcom Broadcasting Code “Competitions should be conducted fairly…”; and
Rule 10.10 of the Ofcom Broadcasting Code "Any use of premium rate numbers must comply with the Code of Practice issued by ICSTIS" (now re-named as PhonepayPlus).

Ofcom's investigation found that on a number of occasions programme makers deliberately put to air text entrants with incorrect answers in order to prevent the prize from being won too soon. As a result, those listeners who had paid to enter the competition on these occasions had no chance of winning.

The seriousness of the compliance failures was compounded by some of the actions taken by GCap after the incidents had come to light.

Ofcom has also directed each of the 30 licensees to broadcast a summary of Ofcom’s finding on two separate occasions.

The full Adjudication is available at:

http://www.ofcom.org.uk/tv/obb/ocsc_adjud/30GCapRadioStations.pdf

Ofcom fines radio broadcasters for unfair conduct in a listener competition

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