The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has that found Kimberly-Clark, owners of Andrex, were misleading customers by not saying whether their toilet wipes were tested against the water industry Fine to Flush standard.

The ASA has ruled that content on a Kimberley Clark website for Andrex toilet wipes was misleading advertising following a challenge by a complainant that the claim "flushable" was misleading.

The ASA was ruling on text seen on 21 April 2019 which featured on www.andrex.co.uk, a website for Andrex toilet wipes, which stated:

"At Kimberly-Clark we test all our products to make sure they pass all INDA and EDANA industry standards (they're the international associations serving the nonwovens and related industries that set guidelines on flushability of wet wipes). This means our flushable Washlets are specially designed to break down in moving water, so they won't block your toilet if your sewage system is well maintained and you follow the directions on the packaging".

In its response, Kimberly-Clark said that they recognised their product did not meet Water UK’s Fine to Flush specification developed by Water Research Centre (WRc) but disagreed that was the most useful measure of whether a wipe was flushable. They said that Water UK’s study on “Wipes in Sewer Blockage” of December 2017 found no evidence that wipes compliant with GD3 guidelines were the cause of any blockages analysed.

The ASA said it noted the terms “Flushability” and “Flushable” appeared at the top of the web page, with the latter forming part of the label given to the product to signify its ability to be flushed down the toilet. The label included an image of a hand throwing a wipe into an open toilet above the text “Look for this label”.

“ In that context, we considered that consumers would understand from the ad that there was a single standard used to determine whether a product was capable of being flushed down the toilet without causing blockages and that the label was the standardised marker which notified them that products met that standard.” the ASA said.

The Authority noted Kimberly-Clark’s comments that those products that complied with INDA and EDANA’s GD3 guidelines had not been found to cause any blockages in Water UK’s study of 2017, but also that Water UK maintained the sewer blockages found in their 2017 report largely consisted of an unidentified mass of wipes, which made it impossible to draw conclusions about the nature of the wipes that caused the blockage.

The ASA concluded that the ad had breached rules on misleading advertising, saying:

“Consequently, we considered that in order to make an informed decision, it was material for consumers to know that another accreditation existed in relation to a product’s ‘flushability’, which Andrex Washlets had not been given. In the absence of qualifying information to that effect, we concluded that the claim “flushable” was misleading.

Kimberly-Clark Ltd has been told that the ad must not appear again in its current form and to ensure that their future advertising does not omit material information, such as that the products did not conform to other relevant UK standards on whether a product was considered flushable.

Andrex® Washlets™ have not yet been tested against the new flushability standard, however they are now working in full collaboration with Water UK to adopt this UK standard at the earliest possible time.

Manufacturers can have their wipes tested by WRc, the Swindon-based independent technical experts who developed the specifications for flushability standards in conjunction with Water UK. If they pass the tests, manufacturers will receive the ‘Fine to Flush' symbol from WRc to add to their packaging.

The technical name for ‘Fine to Flush' is Water Industry Specification 4-02-06, and the full details of the specification can be found on the Water UK website.

Thames Water and Anglian Water welcomes landmark ruling on flushability

Anglian Water has welcomed the landmark ruling - Rachel Dyson, Anglian Water's Keep It Clear programme manager said:

"We are delighted that it has been recognised that companies cannot ignore the Fine to Flush Standard which was launched earlier this year. Companies whose products pass the standard are letting consumers know that their products don't contain plastic and will break down in the sewer system instead of clogging up sewers and contributing to blockages, fatbergs and sewage overflows."

Unflushables such as wet wipes contribute to the 80 per cent of the 40,000 blockages across the East of England each year. Most of the blockages are entirely preventable, but instead lead to devastating sewage spills, can harm the environment and cost more than £19 million each year to clear.

Thames Water has also welcomed the ruling which comes just days after the company pulled another giant mass of wipes which stretched for almost 20 metres from a sewer in North London The mass of wet wipes resulted in the sewers flooding several gardens and took a team of engineers more than five hours to remove.

Thames Water network performance manager Stephen Pattenden said:

“This was hundreds of wipes stuck together which caused unpleasant flooding for customers and had to be removed by hand.

“Wet wipes are a major problem across our network so we welcome anything which helps to clarify the issue for customers.

“We accept wet wipes are convenient but we would ask anyone using them to make sure they look for the Fine to Flush logo so we can reduce the number of blockages in our sewers which would in turn cut pollution.”

Each year, Thames Water clears 75,000 blockages, at a cost of £18 million, with wet wipes that do not break down in the system being a major cause.

In the UK alone, water companies estimate it costs around £100 million a year to unblock sewers clogged up by wipes and hygiene products. This does not include the human and environmental impact and cost.