The Regional Court of Gera was the third court to deal with the advertising of driving schools with driving simulators (judgment of 20.02.2017 – 11 HKO 57/16). According to this ruling, advertising with a price saving due to a usable driving simulator was also misleading and therefore anti-competitive. As a result, the driving school was prohibited from advertising with the slogan “Our students save up to €240 per course thanks to the lower price of the simulator units“.
Gera Regional Court joins the case law on advertising with driving simulators
With this decision, Gera Regional Court follows the case law of Berlin Regional Court (judgment of 11.03.2004 – 102 O 82/04) and Nuremberg-Fürth Regional Court (judgment of 01.02.2007 – 1 HKO 7432/06). These already prohibited driving schools from advertising with the statement that practice lessons on a driving simulator replace up to four practical driving lessons. Advertising that the use of a driving simulator reduces training costs is also inadmissible.
Attached “study” does not prove the price saving
In the case to be decided by the Gera Regional Court, the driving school was unable to objectively and empirically prove through a study that the learner drivers actually save EUR 240. The study, which the driving school submitted as evidence in the proceedings, was merely based on a survey of driving school companies and learner drivers, but not on actual data collected. Even the study submitted pointed out that it did not provide any scientific evidence of cost savings for learner drivers.
Benefits of the driving simulator depend on the skills of the learner drivers
Even if there is no doubt that exercises on the driving simulator can certainly be helpful, it is also clear that the benefit always depends on the individual skills of the learner driver. Whether the use of the simulator actually leads to cost savings therefore always depends on the skills of the individual learner driver. In addition to savings, there is also the possibility that certain learner drivers will not save any costs by using the driving simulator. This is because the driving simulator unit cannot replace a real driving lesson one hundred percent.
Advertising with price savings misleading
Driving schools are permitted to advertise that a driving simulator can be used as additional practice. They are also allowed to fully refer to the advantages of such a simulator in their advertising. Only the statement that the use leads to a price saving is inadmissible. This is because driving schools are obliged by law to provide price transparency in their advertising. Therefore, if the price shown is not transparent enough or if the advertised savings do not apply to everyone, the advertising is fundamentally misleading and anti-competitive.