I recently won a competition, but...

loopa1

Hi all
I recently won a competion (yaay!) and was informed of my sucess one week before the 'event' was due to take place. Having every intention of attending, I checked travel and accommodation costs (not included with the prize) but deemed them to be too expensive so much to my disappointment I didn't go. Had I been given more than one weeks notice, travel to/from London and accommodation would have been cheaper.

Now my question is, given the following was stated in the promotor's terms and conditions, and one of those terms were breached by them, do I have reason to claim an alternative prize?

Two conditions state the following:
The winners will be drawn at random the day the draw closes on 8th August 2011”
and
“The winner will be informed by email or phone within two days of the draw..."

I was informed of winning my prize on the 31st August 2011, 7 days before the event was due to take place and over 3 weeks after the draw took place. Where do I stand?

bod1467

Have you tried contacting them?

loopa1

Yes - emailed them explaining I wasn't going to attend due to it being too expensive to get down to London largely due to being given only 1 weeks notice, and that they had breached their own terms, however I'm still waiting for a reply.

boobyd

You might not have been the "original" winner ? hence the delay ? Some one else could have won ( or more ) they did not reply etc etc so you were reserve
Wait for the reply then take from there.

loopa1

100 winners were chosen.

The person who contacted me to let me know I had won said I had to confirm "today" if I could attend or not so that emails could be sent out the following day (I'd asked if I could get back in touch to see if I could take time off work). So I accepted the prize.

Given the generic "dear prize winner" confirmation email I got the following day, I presume the other competition winners received the same email on that day too.

Biketrials08

What is it you've actually won, this sounds like a scam to go to some 'event' where you'll probably be sold some timeshare or something...?

mrschuck

what is it u won xxx:)

loopa1

It was a recent competition with NatWest - it's legit.