Illegal house lottery - prize draw halted by the gambling commission

MrDT

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/devon/7673461.stm

Brian and Wendy Wilshaw sold 46,000 tickets costing £25 each for the chance to win the £1m Oldborough Mansion estate near Crediton.
But a message posted on their website informs entrants the draw has been halted by the Gambling Commission.

moanymoany

I presume they have to return all the money they took, and not be able to take out any fee for administration.

The house was way overpriced which is why they couldn't sell it when they first put it on the market - ages ago!

morganb

From http://www.winadevonpropertywithfishing.co.uk/postponement.php

Postponement of Draw Date

We are so sorry to have to tell all of our entrants that the Draw has been postponed.
The Gambling Commission have begun looking into the concept of House Competitions generally and as part of that process we have contacted and are in discussions with them to confirm that the competition meets their requirements.
At this late stage of proceedings, the Gambling Commission have asked for more information on the Competition question, despite the fact that we approached them for guidance before the start of the competition in March of this year, only to be told that they had no issues with our conduct or the running of the competition.
It seems that after our success, which was only made possible by our entrants and the public support which we’ve received, a number of copycat projects have launched which the commission are concerned may not comply with their guidelines. This means that they are looking into all similar competitions and raising issues over the concept of dealing with property in this innovative way.
We have been asked to demonstrate why we believe that our question prevented a significant number of people from participating in the competition, which is the main legal test to decide whether or not the competition is authentic rather than a simple lottery or game of chance.
We and our Solicitor have responded immediately and told the Commission that only a small minority of the population have purchased coarse fishing licences over the past year – around 500,000 from an adult population of 45 million. As such, only a small minority of the public would know the answer to our question without any basic research over the internet which the Commission’s guidance stated was in line with the current legislation.
We realise that the Commission will need to make checks given the sheer number of sites coming on line, but we are of course frustrated by the timing of their queries and the fact that they have previously made open statements to us and to the national press that the Competition was lawful. We were asked to postpone the draw on October 3rd and since then have done everything we can to assist the commission and to demonstrate that we have followed their guidelines to the letter, however the process is still ongoing and as such we have no choice but to postpone the draw to ensure that all of our entrants still receive their chance to win.
We, like you, are desperately disappointed by this news, coming so close to what should have been the most exciting time in this project and the realisation of handing the keys to our dream property to the lucky winner. We are also devastated that, by changing the rules after the process began, the Commission may decide that our dream may not be realised.
We are continuing our discussions with the Commission and can reassure all of you that the entry fund is still in place and still safe. The worst case scenario is that all of our entrants will be issued with a full refund if the draw does not go ahead.
In the meantime, we are eternally grateful for all of your support and would be delighted if you could forward on any messages of support to us via E-Mail to [EMAIL="brianwilshaw@eclipse.co.uk"]brianwilshaw@eclipse.co.uk[/EMAIL] with the words ’Public Support’ in the subject line so that we can pass them on to the Gambling Commission in the hope of making this dream a reality.”
(We hope that you can appreciate that we may not be able to send you an acknowledgment for any of these emails of support).
Brian, Wendy and Louisa Wilshaw

formulaonefan

MrDT wrote: »

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/devon/7673461.stm

Brian and Wendy Wilshaw sold 46,000 tickets costing £25 each for the chance to win the £1m Oldborough Mansion estate near Crediton.
But a message posted on their website informs entrants the draw has been halted by the Gambling Commission.

It is illegal to hold lottery for personal profit. I'm glad gambling commission is taking action. Otherwise it would have opened flood gates for more of them to follow the same method and before you know it will turn into a big gambling scam and we all will be talking about it in the pub. We already have loads to talk about in pub (i.e. house prices, credit crunch, bailing out banks etc)

andys15

£25 for a ticket. Blimey, if some of the peoples prediction in here come true, you will be able to buy the house for £25 come the next millenium. I am sure my great great great great great grandughter will love it.(couldn't be bothered typing anymore greats before some maths experts corrects me)

FraudBuster

Great to see some good news.

lynzpower

Great to see one of these so called "toothless quangos" getting stuck in :T

teabelly

They talked to the Gambling commission *first* who said what they were doing was ok now the GC have turned around and said that it isn't! This is the problem. Under the rules you have to have a question which excludes a lot of people from answering, questions about fishing licence prices is pretty odd. Arguing that anyone can find it on t'internet is a bit facile as anything you wanted to know is pretty much around somewhere which would make all quizzes illegal under the same rules.

baby_boomer

Will they stop this one, too? - This is Money

"....The home will be won by the person who offers the lowest price - not the highest. Bids can range between £0 and £22,400. But the catch is this: the winner must chose a figure that has not been selected by any other bidder..."

I think it's more than likely. The gambling only starts once enough people have signed up to meet her asking price .

These farces shouldn't be allowed.

Legislate quickly so that we don't have quangos and public servants wasting taxpayers' money trying to stop these chancers.

If this takes off, the National Lottery could go out of business!

And think of the poor estate agents .

Gorgeous_George

teabelly wrote: »

They talked to the Gambling commission *first* who said what they were doing was ok now the GC have turned around and said that it isn't! This is the problem. Under the rules you have to have a question which excludes a lot of people from answering, questions about fishing licence prices is pretty odd. Arguing that anyone can find it on t'internet is a bit facile as anything you wanted to know is pretty much around somewhere which would make all quizzes illegal under the same rules.

Spot on. They tried to cover all legal requirements but it was only after 46,000 willing participants bought tickets that the Gambling Quango decided to flex its muscles. This case needs to go to court to establish if any laws are broken.

I cannot see anything wrong with what they were doing providing they complied with the law and paid any taxes due (such as income tax if the property 'sold' for more than its open market valuation).

I can understand the usual posters objecting on (please text your answer to 0904 !!!!!!!) - calls cost £1 from a BT line, calls from mobiles and other networks may be considerably more):

a. moral grounds
b. out of jealousy
c. Keith Chegwin



GG

Sir_Humphrey

baby_boomer wrote: »

Will they stop this one, too? - This is Money

"....The home will be won by the person who offers the lowest price - not the highest. Bids can range between £0 and £22,400. But the catch is this: the winner must chose a figure that has not been selected by any other bidder..."

I think it's more than likely. The gambling only starts once enough people have signed up to meet her asking price .

To be fair, that sounds more like an auction than a lottery.