Guide
Marketing and advertising law
Legal requirements for promoting your business.
All advertising and marketing must be legal, decent, honest, and truthful. The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) enforces these rules for most forms of advertising in the UK.
Alcohol advertising and minimum pricing
If you advertise or sell alcohol, you must comply with additional regulations that vary significantly across the UK nations. Alcohol minimum unit pricing also differs by location.
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Check the CAP Code
The UK Code of Advertising applies to most marketing communications.
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Keep evidence
Hold proof for any claims you make in advertisements.
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Disclose commercial relationships
Use #ad, #advert, or 'advertisement' for paid content. Avoid ambiguous terms.
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Check minimum pricing if selling alcohol
Scotland (65p), Wales (50p), England/NI (none). Ensure compliant pricing if applicable.
Website and digital accessibility requirements
Under the Equality Act 2010, all UK businesses must make 'reasonable adjustments' to ensure websites, apps, and digital services are accessible to people with disabilities. This is an anticipatory duty - you must proactively identify and remove barriers before disabled users encounter them.
What you must do
- Follow Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2 Level AA - the recognised standard for compliance
- Ensure your site works with assistive technologies (screen readers, screen magnifiers, speech recognition)
- Provide text alternatives for images, keyboard navigation, sufficient colour contrast (4.5:1 minimum for text)
- Make content understandable and navigation consistent
- Ensure forms have clear labels and helpful error messages
Public sector organisations
Have additional legal obligations under the Public Sector Bodies Accessibility Regulations 2018:
- Mandatory WCAG 2.2 AA compliance (became legal standard October 2023, public sector monitoring from October 2024)
- Legally required accessibility statement explaining compliance status
- Monitored by Government Digital Service (GDS)
Accessibility statements (best practice)
While not legally required for private sector, publishing an accessibility statement demonstrates:
- Your commitment to accessibility
- Known issues and workarounds
- How users can report accessibility problems
- Your improvement roadmap
Business case
- £274 billion: Annual spending power of disabled consumers and families ('Purple Pound') - DWP 2020 estimate
- £17.1 billion: Lost annually by UK businesses from disabled customers abandoning inaccessible websites (Click-Away Pound Survey 2019 - latest available data)
- 1 in 4 UK residents have a disability (25% of population - 16.8 million people). For working-age adults (16-64), it's 1 in 5 (20%)
Enforced by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC). Disabled users can file discrimination claims if they encounter accessibility barriers.
Consequences of non-compliance:
- Compensation payments: £3,000+ typical settlements for discrimination claims
- Court orders: Requiring accessibility improvements
- Legal costs
- Reputational damage
Public sector bodies may also be publicly named by GDS for non-compliance with accessibility statements.