Trademe are providing a discount on success fees today. They sent me an email. However the HTML content of the email is very different from the plain text version (they used MIME to provide two different versions of the same email). The HTML version says 50% off, the plain text version says free selling on $1 reserve.

I wonder what the legal position on this is? In this case the email includes a date and the dates differ. I noticed because gmail search shows an excerpt from the plain text, and it was a little confusing.

This is the start of the plain text email:

Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Get set for free selling tomorrow! Tell me more Hi Peter,=20 Just a heads up =E2=80=93 we=E2=80=99re giving you free selling on $1 reser= ve general items and cars under $10k! List your general items for $1 reserve on Saturday 23 May and pay no succes= s fees when they sell.=C2=B9 Start selling your car for under $10,000 on Saturday 23 May and get a free = basic listing.=C2=B2

Clearly today is not the 23rd of May, and this is a mistake that doesn't overly concern me. But I wonder what would happen if the difference was less obvious. With a MIME email, most email clients will just display the HTML version, and there is no easy way to see the plain text one, but even then it can make it's way into google searches etc.