Worse than Reader's Digest?

[craigiep]

Whenever I've been landed with one of those leaflets or letters telling me I have DEFINITELY WON one of an enticing list of prizes, that list always includes a trip to somewhere you're pretty unlikely to want to visit - and there's never any details about how much of the trip the prize pays for. And, oddly enough, when you phone in to see which prize you've won, it's always the last one - which means you've run up a big phone bill to make that company money - and it's always that useless holiday. Have you or anyone you know ever won any of the decent prizes on offer in these things?

[sp1814]

A colleague 'won' free flights to Mexico a few years ago, and it was a genuine free prize, but the strings attached made it pretty worthless.

The catch was that the flights were part of a holiday package. The flights were indeed free, but you had to fly out at about 04:45am (return was in the early hours too). In addition, the hotel he had to stay at was about three times the price of all the others in the area.

Like my mum always says, there's no such thing as a free lunch (unless you steal from Burger King).

[ludwig]

The thing you've 'won' is always the holiday, and there's always a condition attached.
e.g you have to buy their travel insurance - a bargain at �1500.
or you have to pay for an expensive hotel as you've said above, which coincidentally costs about the same as a normal hotel plus a flight to mexico.
It's always bollox. Don't ring the number, that's a con as well. Just bin the letter.

[Scylax]

We are all being bombarded with dozens of such
scams on a daily basis.

They all rely on a certain degree of feeble-mindedness
in the general population.

The pseudo-quizzes and game-show phone-ins
on TV justify my cynicism.

As for telephone numbers beginning 09 or 07, well...
try using the excellent:
www.saynoto0870.co.uk
to bypass these scammers.

[johnny37]

I put them straight in the bin. I used to carry out the process for someone who was not buying the product and never heard any more. What worries me is the massive amount of money these scammer make (with premium rate calls etc) before they are forced out of business and just go on to the next scam. Someone is getting rich.

[Pippa68]

I usually won the �10 watch ~ which cost me �10 in phone calls and an extra �3.50 P&P.

I bin EVERYTHING related to prize numbers nowadays...even if it means me possibly losing out on a cinema sized telly.