Countdown Timers And Stock Claims

The Short Version

The CMA's guidance lists banned practices. Two matter for urgency claims: falsely saying a product will be available only for a very limited time, and saying stock is limited when you cannot supply it.

Countdown Timers

• A countdown that restarts, so the offer carries on after it reaches zero, may give a false impression of urgency. The CMA uses a restarting clock as an example.
• A true statement of when an offer really ends is, according to the guidance, unlikely to be a problem.

Stock And Sales Claims

• "Only a few left" may be a problem if you cannot actually supply the stock you are advertising.
• Live claims such as "we've sold 10 in the last 5 minutes" should be true. The CMA uses this as an example of a possible misleading action.

A Quick Self-Check

• Is every timer tied to a real end date?
• Do your stock messages come from real stock figures?
• Could you show the data behind a "sold recently" message if asked?

What We Do

SiteAudit checks product and offer pages for patterns like these and ranks any it finds as possible risks, confirmed by a reviewer.

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