Haji-Ioannou defies ASA over AOL-bashing price campaign

Stelios Haji-Ioannou has stepped up his campaign against AOL, the world’s biggest Internet service provider. He is continuing to run easyInternetCafé ads comparing its Internet access to AOL’s despite a recent ruling by the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) that the ads are unfair (MW last week).

The ASA could now request media owners not to accept future work from easyInternetCafé, and could ultimately refer the matter to the Office of Fair Trading.

EasyInternetCafé will run a poster campaign in January on London Underground, again comparing the price of an AOL subscription with the price of monthly access to an easyInternetCafé.

However, a spokeswoman for Viacom, which has the contract to run the advertising on London Underground, says: “We would need to seek advice from both the ASA and London Underground, which would not want to be involved in anything controversial.”

EasyGroup director of corporate affairs James Rothnie claims Viacom has already vetted the campaign and agreed to run it. He also adds that the campaign has been created in direct defiance of the ASA’s ruling last week, and challenges the ASA’s opinion that the ad does not compare like-for-like services.

Haji-Ioannou put &£15m of his money into the Internet chain in September to save it from insolvency.