Rules and ethics
Part of Legal and ethical gates for one England UGC commission, with no marketplace shortcut
UGC marketplaces and advertising rules: checking one advert for recognition, claims and rights
Use this UGC marketplaces advertising rules checklist to review one England advert for disclosure, claims, incentives, rights, accessibility and corrections.
Use this UGC marketplaces advertising rules checklist to assess a commissioned UGC asset before judging its creative quality. For marketplace-sourced work, check the campaign brief and current brand/creator terms alongside the advertising rules for the intended channel. This checklist concerns one English brand unit, one short-form creator-made asset and one intended channel. It cannot clear a live advert because the product, claims, incentive, creator authority, audience context and final rendering are not yet supplied; it is a pre-publication checklist, not legal clearance.
Examples of UGC marketplace services include Billo and Insense. For a booking made through either, record the marketplace's role and check whether the current campaign terms and workflow specify disclosure, approval, publication, usage rights and withdrawal; do not assume a marketplace workflow replaces the rules of the publishing channel.
What to take away
- Recognition and substantiation are independent gates, so an Ad label cannot make an inaccurate claim accurate.
- Document who commissioned the work, every payment and who controls publication before judging creative quality.
- The checklist passes only when every relevant advertising, consumer, rights, safeguarding, accessibility, privacy and security owner admits current evidence.
Classify the communication
- Record who commissioned the work, who exercised editorial control, every payment, gift, service, loan, discount or commission, and who will publish it.
- Separate the brand, agency, marketplace operator, creator, representative, paid publisher, social platform and any independent editorial actor. Do not describe paid placement as independent coverage.
- Ask a UK advertising and consumer-law reviewer whether the material is a marketing communication and which CAP sections or statutory provisions apply.
- For marketplace-sourced work, record any disclosure, approval, publication, rights and withdrawal requirements in the current campaign brief and terms; distinguish these from the channel's own advertising requirements.
CAP Code Section 2 and rule 2.1 state that marketing communications must be obviously identifiable. CAP's guidance, Recognising ads: Social media and influencer marketing, says a platform label may not always be sufficient on its own. Test the visible result in its actual format rather than relying on a workflow setting.
Admit each claim separately
- Copy every express and implied product claim into a register.
- Name the evidence owner, documentary source, population, method, geography, date, limitations and expiry.
- Block wording that extends beyond the admitted evidence, including a creator's factual testimonial.
Under CAP Code rule 3.7, marketers must hold documentary evidence before distribution for objective claims capable of substantiation. A substantiation file for a typical efficacy claim should contain the study protocol, sample, method, results, date, geography, limitations and expiry.
Record the relationship and rights
The CMA's guidance, Social media endorsements: being transparent with your followers, addresses disclosure of commercial relationships and incentives. Record the relationship in the brief and contract, and set out who monitors and corrects the advert; do not assume one standard phrase works in every placement.
For example, a brief for a paid Reel could require: "Creator will use Instagram's Paid partnership label and write 'Paid partnership with Brand' in the first caption line. Creator will not remove the label before publication."
Check creator and representative authority. List the licence or permission for the performance, script, footage, music, images, trademarks, featured people, edits, territory, channels, period and reuse. IPO guidance says a commissioner is not automatically first owner of a commissioned copyright work unless the parties agree otherwise in writing.
Inspect the audience-facing render
- Open the exact published-format preview on each proposed channel.
- Check when and where the commercial indication appears, including before interaction.
- Test captions, transcript, text alternatives, contrast and essential audio or visual information against WCAG 2.2 AA.
- Keep age uncertainty and child safeguarding as a separate review; do not infer age from appearance.
The EHRC's current services code is statutory guidance for England, Scotland and Wales. It does not certify this asset. A qualified equality and accessibility reviewer should record what was tested and what remains unknown.
Prepare correction and withdrawal
Name who monitors the authorised channels, receives complaints, pauses paid distribution, corrects a claim or disclosure, withdraws an asset and preserves the decision trail. Name the brand complaints owner, the platform escalation route and the ASA or CMA complaint route. Final status: HOLD until the named compliance owner records a signed decision.
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) handles complaints about ad recognition and content. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) handles consumer-law breaches.
The consumer-law reviewer should also check the complete transaction, not just the video. Under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024, the unfair-commercial-practices provisions apply to conduct from 6 April 2025. Record price presentation, material qualifications, destination page and complaint route against the actual audience journey. That UK guidance does not decide this unpublished case.
Worked example: one England UGC advert
Take an illustrative England brief: a skincare brand pays a creator for a 30-second Instagram Reel. Classify it as a paid partnership; the brand commissioned it, the creator kept editorial control and the platform label plus caption must identify it. Register the claim "reduces redness in seven days".
The substantiation file should hold the study protocol, sample, method, results, date, limitations and expiry; without that file, block the claim. The contract should assign copyright to the brand and license the performance, footage, music and creator likeness for UK paid social for 12 months.
In the render, check the paid partnership label appears before interaction and that captions meet WCAG 2.2 AA. For correction, name the brand complaints owner, the platform escalation route and the ASA complaint route. Final status stays open until the named compliance owner signs off.
Before you act
- Record who commissioned the work and who exercised editorial control.
- Copy every express and implied product claim into a register.
- Name the evidence owner, source, method, date and limitations.
- List the licence or permission for performance, script, footage, music, images and trademarks.
- Open the exact published-format preview on each proposed channel.
- Name who monitors channels, receives complaints, corrects claims and withdraws assets.
Common questions
Can an Ad label alone make a claim compliant?
No. Recognition and substantiation are independent gates, and an Ad label cannot make a claim accurate. Under CAP Code rule 3.7, marketers must hold documentary evidence before distribution for objective claims capable of substantiation. CAP's guidance, Recognising ads: Social media and influencer marketing, also says a platform label may not always be sufficient on its own.
Who owns the copyright in a commissioned UGC asset?
IPO guidance says a commissioner is not automatically first owner of a commissioned copyright work unless the parties agree otherwise in writing. So check creator and representative authority, and list the licence or permission for the performance, script, footage, music, images, trademarks, featured people, edits, territory, channels, period and reuse.
What should the consumer-law reviewer check beyond the video?
The complete transaction. Under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024, the unfair-commercial-practices provisions apply to conduct from 6 April 2025. Record price presentation, material qualifications, destination page and complaint route against the actual audience journey. That UK guidance does not decide this unpublished case.
