Hidden Disclosures

A. It is an unfair or deceptive trade practice for a dealer to obscure or make misleading any material fact in any advertisement or sales presentation by the use of layout, headlines, illustrations, footnotes, style, sound, length of time, lighting, color or type size of an advertisement or any portion of an advertisement. B. It is an unfair or deceptive trade practice for a dealer to use any disclosure or disclaimer in an advertisement unless the disclosure or disclaimer is clear and conspicuous and in close proximity to the terms it modifies. C. It is an unfair or deceptive trade practice for a dealer to use television advertisements with disclosures that are in such fine print or appear on the screen so briefly that they cannot be easily read. 12.2.4 NMAC 3 D. Comment. Each advertisement shall be evaluated for its overall impression. The public should not have to weigh each word, hunt for the hidden meaning of each statement or search for inconspicuous disclaimers. Dealers shall not advertise by placing important disclosures in small print, inconspicuously buried at the bottom of the advertisement. [5-1-98; Recompiled 10/15/01] 12.2.4.14 “FREE GIFTS”: A. It is an unfair or deceptive trade practice for a dealer to represent that another product or service is being offered “free” or at no cost with the sale if a product or service usually is sold at a price arrived at through bargaining, rather than at a fixed price. FTC Guidelines at 16 CFR 251.1(g). B. It is an unfair or deceptive trade practice for a dealer to use the word “free” or words of like meaning and import when describing a gift or other item to be given to a customer who purchases a product or service if the selling price of the product or service is increased as a result of the “free” item or if the product or service can be purchased for a lesser price without the “free” item. [5-1-98; Recompiled 10/15/01]