05/09/2013 00:00
TW
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by RAY FLEMING
HAVE you ever had the feeling that you're paying over the odds for food and drink and other goods at Heathrow, Gatwick and Stanstead airports? Not that there's much you can do about it because by the time you get into the shopping mall that passes for an airport you are effectively a prisoner. And, anyway, BAA has been issuing leaflets claiming that prices in its airports are on a par with your local high street. This may be true if your local high street happens to be in London's West End but not otherwise; Britain's Advertising Standards Authority has just upheld a complaint that BAA's claims are misleading after a survey showed, for instance, that house wine served in airport bars costs 40 per cent more than it does in bars run by the same company in regional cities. BAA's promise that prices “are matched to their high street equivalents” is interpreted by W H Smith to mean that the comparison should be with their Oxford Street Plaza branch.

The Advertising Standards Authority has told BAA to withdraw the leaflets and its claim that “The price of food and drink sold in BAA airports is matched with the UK high street, so you won't pay a penny more than you're used to.” But one is left to wonder why a company like BAA would go to the trouble in the first place of making claims it must have known were wrong or unenforceable.