MTN advert | Advertising watchdog nails mobile giant

JOHANNESBURG - The Advertising Regulatory Board has rapped MTN over the knuckles for misleading advertising.

It says MTN misled customers, promising them free items with a new cellphone contract while failing to clarify that the offer was limited to one thousand in-store customers.

In a September catalogue, the mobile operator advertised a Xiaomi Redmi Note 11 LTE device for R299 on a 24-month contract.

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According to the advert, free items included a MiBand and a Xiaomi TV stick.

MTN argues the conditions appeared elsewhere in the promotional booklet.

The Advertising Regulatory Board did not accept its reasoning.