A regional newspaper has been rapped by advertising watchdogs over a ‘misleading’ wedding promotion.

The Evening Gazette, Teesside, offered readers the chance to win a “dream wedding worth over £10,000.”

However the winner complained that the claim that the prize was worth over £10,000 was misleading, as were the list of prizes.

And in a ruling published today, the Advertising Standards Authority upheld her complaint against the Trinity Mirror owned title.

The Gazette ran the promotion in conjunction with a hotel and a number of associated suppliers.

It said the cost for all the component parts of the prize, which totalled over £10,000, were given to them by the suppliers directly, based on what they would normally charge on peak dates.

However, the ASA said that if the winner had chosen an off-peak date for their wedding, the reduced cost of the hotel reception would mean that the overall cost of the prize would be worth less than the advertised amount of £10,000.

The authority considered that the fact that the value of the hotel reception was based on peak rates should have been included in the small print, in order to make clear to consumers the basis on which the £10,000 prize was based. “Because it was not we concluded that on this point the promotion was misleading,” it ruled.

The ASA also said the promotion’s offer of a ‘made-to-measure bridal gown’ was actually a voucher to the value of £600 while the ‘fresh bridal flowers’ prize was only to the value of £400.

“We considered that those limitations were significant qualifications to the prize and should have been made clear in the promotion in order to avoid unnecessary disappointment. We therefore concluded that the promotion gave a misleading impression of those two elements of the prize.”

However it rejected a further complaint that the prizes did not include a vintage car or a wedding album.

The ASA ruled that the promotion must not be used again in its current form.