Ever told a white lie for a Competition?

hdh74 · 28 March 2018 at 5:26PM

I do alter my DOB slightly though, I don't even think of that as cheating tbh - I nearly lost my bank savings due to a comp - lesson learned!

elsien · 28 March 2018 at 5:32PM

I also have a comping date of birth. I thought I might come unstuck when my dob had to be confirmed for a holiday win, but when I was upfront about the reason they were fine with it.

I don't call putting nephews etc down as cheating. The people running the competition just want the publicity and quite frankly don't care who wins it. I do have limits though - no wedding prizes, no fan stuff that I won't use as I'd rather that went to a true fan, no baby stuff.

grannybiker · 28 March 2018 at 9:58PM

Enigmatic_Me wrote: »

I too have a comping date of birth.

Caused me endless problems though when I applied for a credit card and used my autofill :eek: Yes you have guessed it the application went through with my very much younger DOB

This meant I failed the first security check when I had to contact them about something. I therefore had to go in with ID. Took a special 20 mile trip to the nearest branch with my ID which they then lost and never changed on their records. I lost the plot when they asked me to go back again with ID so made an official complaint and it was eventually all sorted out. Gave me much stress though lol.

:rotfl: That happened to me when trying to book my regular sight test at Tesco opticians :rotfl:

Oh and I regularly lie as I tick the "I have read the T&Cs" box.

I-Owe-You · 29 March 2018 at 8:16AM

Yes! Well not a lie per say, just didn't realise what I was entering!

My partner is a huge Arsenal fan. I stupidly entered a competition for Junior Gunners (I didnt know what that was and was not asked for DOB or "name of child" in the entry form!) - not realising it was aimed at children. I was so excited to have won him the tickets, which included a meet and greet with the dinosaur mascot and the seats were in the children's enclosure of the ground!

We only realised this when the tickets arrived marketed at children and I looked into the T&Cs a little more! My partner feared a "Del Boy and Rodney" competition moment with him needing to wear his hair in pig-tails so we gave the tickets to a family friend (who's young son was very grateful and had a smashing day!)

I'm a lot more careful what I enter now!

eleanorre · 29 March 2018 at 9:46AM

In the old days of entry forms I fed my cat dog food for a couple of days to get the labels off the tins. I won a trailer tent with my slogan and entry.I was presented with my prize and was told not to mention I did not actually have a dog which I had let slip .

TheNinjaJellyfish · 30 March 2018 at 7:55PM

I'm new to comping. Why do people change their DOB? - Should I be doing this?

sleepyjones · 31 March 2018 at 12:27PM

I'm sure everyone does ... entering specialist sites comps like Jewish News , wedding Magazine, Gransnet, Parentsnet, Mumsnet, dadsnet, silver surfers, gay sites, ... whatever it may be, you would assume you should be part of that demographic of people... "Only for listeners of Radio X" type comps, comps where you're supposed to buy the magazine, Survey on your visit etc etc.

These are all "lies" to a certain degree.

You might need to be careful with some comps though if your white lie happens to be about your age, some comps do require you to supply ID, so be wary if you're entering for holiday / age related prizes (booze etc) as you may need to provide ID and if it doesn't match with what you've said in your entry you could be disqualified (whether or not they would actually cross reference it is another issue but you never know)

libra10 · 31 March 2018 at 3:56PM

Just as a side note about reading T & C.

Last week I won a lovely prize of several Easter eggs and treats. The company was based near London, and they messaged me asking me to collect.

I live in the North West and asked the company could they post and I would pay postage. They refused, stating T & C conditions, and I asked them to give the prize to a local charity. It was a Facebook competition and I hadn't seen any reference to T & C.

Terms and Conditions are so long and it's impossible to read every flippin' clause, but I wouldn't have entered the comp if I had realised. Will take more care in future.

sleepyjones · 31 March 2018 at 9:45PM

Terms are really only there to cover themselves. I can understand why they wouldn't want to post the item, if you send them money and it gets lost, if they post the item and you've paid the postage and it gets lost in the post ... it'll just cause all kinds of problems for them so it's probably not worth the effort for them, especially if they've covered themselves in the Terms (I'm sure they'll exist somewhere on "Notes" on their page or on the website or something).

For the most part (I'm sure you know, you've been here for a while, but if there's any nOObies here), if the comp is posted here, someone will post the important terms, such as "collect in" ... I think if you were going to read a lot of the terms you'd probably spend half your day doing it so unless it's obvious (small local shops on FB or TW generally are collect comps), probably best to just enter anyway and on the off chance you do win and you don't meet the terms, shrug it off and move on.

That's a shame though, I hope they did give it to a charity.

NBLondon · 3 April 2018 at 12:30PM

TheNinjaJellyfish wrote: »

I'm new to comping. Why do people change their DOB? - Should I be doing this?

To avoid identity thieves. e.g. I don't have my true DoB on Facebook - anybody who actually knows me knows it's a fake and anybody who tries to use it to impersonate me comes unstuck.

To be honest - no competition organiser needs my full Date of Birth - only that I am over 18. I have once had to provide evidence of being an adult before an alcoholic prize was sent out - I sent the real evidence and it was not cross-checked against the entry.

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Ever told a white lie for a Competition?

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