LEXUS in the UK has been stung by complaints on social media and calls for a ban of television, poster and Facebook advertisements for its UX hybrid.

Complainants said that Lexus described the UX as a “self-charging hybrid” which they believed was misleading.

They said it misrepresented the way the car’s electric battery was recharged by using the petrol engine.

But the UK Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has overturned the objections and thrown out 25 complaints against Lexus parent, Toyota GB, over the ads.

The same advertisement is not shown in Australia. Toyota and Lexus use the term “self-charging hybrid” in Europe and the UK.

The UK ASA said it was satisfied that “hybrid” in a motoring context was likely to be interpreted by consumers to mean that the vehicle is powered through the combination of a petrol engine and a rechargeable electric battery.

It said “self-charging” would be interpreted to mean the internal mechanics of the car would charge the electric battery.

“We considered the ads did not contain any references to other types of car, ‘hybrid’ or otherwise, and did not make any stated or implied claims in relation to the car’s environmental impact,” ASA said in a statement.

“We therefore considered consumers would be unlikely to view the ads as a comparison which implied the ‘self-charging hybrid’ engine was an improvement, including by being more environmentally friendly, compared to other types of hybrid vehicle.”

Lexus said it uses the term “self-charging” to distinguish from hybrid vehicles which require plugging in to an electrical source.

The ASA reported that Lexus said a hybrid vehicle was “self-charging” because it “used technology for the capture, conversion and storage of kinetic energy that would have otherwise been lost from the petrol part of the vehicle’s engine, and secondly, because it used technology for the recovery of energy from its regenerative braking system”.

Lexus agreed that the electric battery relied on energy from the petrol part of the engine which charged the battery while the vehicle was in motion, but that it was also recharged from the braking system.

Lexus said the claim “self-charging hybrid” referred to the overall vehicle which was self-charging, rather than the battery or any other individual component.

By Neil Dowling