The Advertising Standards Authority has rejected challenges from two local Age Concern charities that Age UK adverts claiming the organisation is the result of the merging of Age Concern and Help the Aged are misleading.

Age Concern Hampshire and Age Concern Okehampton & Torridge both complained that a magazine advert which read that ‘Age Concern has joined forces with Help the Aged and we are now known as Age UK’ and a Google sponsored link with a message to the same effect mislead the public in suggesting that all Age Concern had merged to form Age UK.

But the ASA rejected the complaints after Age UK defended its adverts. The national charity said that local charities had only ever used the Age Concern brand name under license from the National Council on Ageing, which had been operating under the Age Concern moniker, for nearly 30 years. The ASA decided that the majority of the public would associate the Age Concern name with the national charity and would not infer that all Age Concern charities had moved under the umbrella of Age UK.

But, unhappy with the adjudication, Age Concern Hampshire has requested an independent review into the complaint, which the ASA has set in process.

Of the 320 independent Age Concern charities that were operating in England, 146 have entered into a new relationship with Age UK.