Coventry Building Society misleading advertising...

It looks to me like deliverate dishonesty. What company of that size, handling £millions, would have some moron who can't punctuate writing their advertising? I've come accross this type of deception a few times, just recently. My guess is that they do it because they think they can get away with it.

A Davidson

Your version, with the additional punctuation, is grammatically incorrect, and doesn't appear to be what they intend to say at all.

They seem to be guaranteeing that their rates will be no lower than the Base Rate for the six months following the first anniversary of you opening an account. Why do you believe their wording is misleading?

Chris

Ask the ASA to look at it

The product with your revised punctuation could be actually be better. Does 'after the first anniversary' not mean 'for all time once the first anniversary has been reached' rather than 'at the instant immediately following the first anniversary'? In which case, that is a guarantee in perpetuity.

Not necessarily. An uncharitable interpretation would take "after the first anniversary" to mean "for some unspecified period after ...".

What exactly led you to that conclusion? Where did you "delve further"? When you follow the "Find out more" link, it gets a bit more explicit:

Besides, your interpretation would be unclear and meaningless, since the only possible thing to which "that" could refer is the immediately foregoing sentence "The rate of interest is fixed at 6.40% AER/gross p.a. for the first year from the date you open your account, after which the rate becomes variable.", and it makes no sense for *that* to be guaranteed for six months (which six months?).

No, JD, you are obviously mistaken.

What is version grammatically incorrect about my version?

Here is the entire paragraph, copied verbatim from their site:

"The rate of interest is fixed at 6.40% AER/gross p.a. for the first year from the date you open your account, after which the rate becomes variable. If you choose the monthly interest option the rate is 6.20% gross p.a., 6.38% AER. And we guarantee that for six months after the first anniversary, the AERs are guaranteed to be no lower than the Bank of England Base Rate (currently 5.25%)."

What they should have said (because it's what they are actually offereing) is as follows (my alteration in the final sentence):

"The rate of interest is fixed at 6.40% AER/gross p.a. for the first year from the date you open your account, after which the rate becomes variable. If you choose the monthly interest option the rate is 6.20% gross p.a., 6.38% AER. And we guarantee that for six months. After the first anniversary, the AERs are guaranteed to be no lower than the Bank of England Base Rate (currently 5.25%)."

Why? Because this is what they *actually* offer (more text, copied verbatim from elsewhere in the site:

" * 50 Plus eSave (3) interest rates are fixed for the first year from the date your account is opened. Thereafter the interest rates are variable. We guarantee that from the thirteenth month up to and including the eighteenth month after the date of opening your account, the Annual Equivalent Rates (AERs) will at least equal the Bank of England Base Rate (see note 5 below). "

Get it now?

JD

No, we don't. The "elsewhere" extract (which specifically refers to the 13th to 18th months) means exactly what the original extract means, and not what your version means.

What they are actually offering is a product which offers an interest rate which is fixed for the first 12 months. For the *next six months* it is variable with a rate guaranteed not to be lower than BoE base, and thereafter is not guaranteed, but still variable.

"The first anniversary" means day one of month 13. "For six months after the first anniversary" means "for months 13 to 18".

What's your problem?

Yes, quite possibly. If so, I'm sorry to waste everyone's time.

JD

"JakeD" wrote

Both their versions appear to say the same thing : "fixed for 12 months, then variable with a guarantee for 6 months, then variable unguaranteed".

But *your* version says something different : "if you open it in the next six months, then it'll be fixed for 12 months. Thereafter, it'll be variable with a guarantee."

Get it now?