Prizebonds

dogbert_the_dog

I know this can be answered with a sharp "of course they do there are thousands(?) of winners every month", but has anyone ever actually won anything with prize bonds?
I've had a dozen for twenty odd years and never won a thing.
Worse again most of the prizes seem to be only 75 euros, which is hardly going to change anyone's life if they do win.

Jello

I've never won anything, but I know someone who won €1,000.

Stephen

i've had a bunch of them for about 15 years, nothing won so far.

nikolaitr

Won 75 a couple years ago on 500 E worth. Worked out just a bit higher than the prevailingrate of interest plus it keeps the gambler in me content

Faerie

I've had them since I was born(gifts from family) and I've never won a thing! I'm beginning to think they're a bit of a con...

dogbert_the_dog

yes that's the same conclusion i've arrived at.
I was hoping for some sort of ironic twist of fate and a winning cheque would come through my door after posting my first message, but apparently that whole concept is a bit of a con too

Frankieboy

Im very glad someone brought this up, it was something I was wondering about. I was planning on investing some money in a month or so and thinking about prizebonds. Now I had them before, about €300 worth and nothing then, (didnt leave them in for to long now either). I dont know anyone that has won money in them, and a know a good few people that have them. So is it a con? Can anyone out there actually put their hand up and say yes I have won. Now I know some people will say €75 but I mean a large prize. I'm sorry in advance but i'm very sceptical about people saying "I know someone or a friend of a friend that won €20,000".

Dizzyblabla

My grandmother has been buying them for years, and wins €75 every couple of weeks, although, taking her advise, I have a few hundred euros worth too, but no, haven't won anything myself!

nikolaitr

I heard somewhere that most of the Bond's are bought by institutions, presumably when they want to keep there Investmenst, in cash....I doubt thats true but could someone shed some light on that?

Frankieboy

Well that seems pretty clear. So thats it Prizebonds are a con! Unless of course anyone that has won a large prize has been sworn to secrecy. Or maybe some more people will see this thread today

grimloch

Neither I nor anyone I know has won anything from them.

Miss Fluff

Isn't there gazillions (well quite a few quid) in unclaimed prize money though!? How is one notified if one actually wins?

Frankieboy

Well the prizebond office is meant to contact you either by phone or letter I believe.

eth0_

My Dad has won a few prizes, mostly small but he won a few thousand once. Then again, he has got thousands of euro worth of them and has had them for decades.

wyndham

Then again, he has got thousands of euro worth of them and has had them for decades.

He has lost a horrific amount of money then. What could he have bought for thousands decades ago?

Piste

Back in November I won €75 from a prizebond mr Granny bought me, she gets me one for Christmas each year, and when I'm 18 I can take put the value of each prizebond in cash, or keep playing them, pretty sweet imho.

Saruman

I got something like £300 worth years ago.. back in the late 90's i think. Never won.. i check the web tracker every now and again.

I remember reading a newspaper article and some rich idiot was giving out about them saying he has had thousands worth of them for 20 years or so and all he won was £10,000.... what an ass.. wish i had won that.. i would have at least appreciated it

Scraggs

My mother is always winning them... every month or so she wins €75 -not much like but better than a kick in the hole:)

faceman

Prizebonds are no different than the lotto or those awful scratchcards!!

abetarrush

I am a prize bond

this thread insults me!

OSiriS

faceman wrote:

Prizebonds are no different than the lotto or those awful scratchcards!!

Damn I've been throwing all my losing lotto tickets in the bin every week, I should collect them and ask for my money back like I can with my prizebonds!

Ballerina

iv never won anything on them..:(

faceman

OSiriS wrote:

Damn I've been throwing all my losing lotto tickets in the bin every week, I should collect them and ask for my money back like I can with my prizebonds!

nobody told you?

i bought 400 worth 6 years ago and i'm still waiting to win something ( probably would of been better spending it in the bookies )

Camo1725

Piste wrote:

Back in November I won €75 from a prizebond mr Granny bought me.

I'm sorry, i don't usually point out typo's but "Mr Granny" made me laugh.

It would be interesting to know how the calculate your chance of winning. Can you win a large sum with a small amount of money?

phantom_lord

u bumped a year old thread for that?



anyway, I've had prize bonds for about 10yrs at this stage and haven't won anything. fecking useless.

cujimmy

when the lottery first started I won 100 and invested it in prize bonds. since then I've won 75euro 3 times and 1000euro once. Kept the 1000 and reinvested the other winnings

Duckjob

€75 on 2.5Ks worth in about 2 yrs. Pretty shítty return really....

...but one day, one day I'll have my 'big win'

testicle

I have a few for 30 years, never won a cent. They're still only worth the same as when they were bought. No inflation factored in or anything.

cson

Ah prize bonds, an ingenius method of taking money out of the economy and returning it depreciated in value.

Almost as good as scratchcards, what a way to get all that social welfare back!

shane86

Havent heard of them in years but I remember they used to be advertised on tv. Didnt they have some mad tagline like "you will always win" or something along those lines, basically saying that if you buy them once there are so many draws you will win eventually?

*Roisin*

Prizebonds are a gamble like anything else. I won't be getting any and I certainly don't think they're a good idea for an investment. Say you but in €2000 today, and leave it ten years like a lot of people do, when you go to cash it in, it's still only going to be worth €2000. What's that going to be worth in ten years time? There's no inflation taking into account or anything like that. Now you might win big of course, and then it'll have been worth it. But most people win something like €100, and that's not going to cover the depreciation of your moneys worth! Or worse, you don't win at all!

No prizebonds for me....

eve

I've had about E1200 invested for a year and haven't won anything. At the time I was looking for somewhere to put some money that I couldn't just withdraw when I wanted. Since then I have opened to monthly saver accounts and its nice to see the balance increasing on them

pigeonbutler

The inner accountant in me decided to read the Prize Bond companies annual report so as to gather evidence that it's not a scam. Firstly it's run by the state (National Treasury Management Agency), secondly it's audited by KPMG so it'd be pretty hard for someone to be just swallowing the money.

It is essentially a cheap way for the government to raise a small amount of its financing needs. The payout rate is 2.4% per annum so the expected return is fairly poor (and it obviously has a massive standard deviation which bank a/c's don't) compared to what a decent savings account will pay you. On the other hand it's clear that with AIB or BOI you've no chance of getting 100K off your €100 investment. So it's not an investment, it's not gambling, it's a kind of bastardised child of the two.

phantom_lord

pigeonbutler wrote:

The payout rate is 2.4% per annum

:eek:

jesus, I'm cashing mine in so.

bp_me

In answer to the original question. Yes. Twice.

looksee

No, small (thank goodness) number of bonds sitting there for 37 years, not a single win.

Nehpets

Not yet! (In response to original question)

drdre

everytime i get prizebonds or someone in the family gets them we usually get 75 euro sent in thepost.its realy crap but just a safe way of saving

Fighting Irish

faceman wrote:

Prizebonds are no different than the lotto or those awful scratchcards!!

:rolleyes: go back to stupidland

luckat

I've won €75 a couple of times, and the cousin, who saves her tax fund each year by investing the money in prize bonds, has won a few grand.

Isn't Fexco a private company?

The government doesn't like prize bonds - prefers that the peasantry should gamble through Lotto, which isn't also a form of savings. It doesn't get enough back from the prize bonds. For years state finance whizzes have been pleading for the prize bonds scheme to be ended, but they're afraid of the power of the fierce grans.

One worrying thing: at some stage I got efficient/paranoid and checked with Fexco that they had a record of all my prize bonds. They didn't have a record of one €100-worth bunch that I'd got with my then employer's 'generous' Christmas bonus.

Maybe there'll be a sudden bunch of pre-election wins for yakky Boards posters, to elicit the feelgood factor...

Duckjob

AFAIK, Fexco is a private company that won the tender to run the prize bonds scheme for the State.

One poster above summed up the prizebond scheme perfectly as a bartardisation of an investment and a gamble -. As a pure investment scheme, it sucks, but there's always that *chance* you'll hit lucky.

pokerwidow

My daughter won €50 after she received €20 as a birthday present. My husband won €75 in the last year after his insurance (car) policy gave him €50 for the year of the policy.

Saint_Mel

I won €25 on a scratch card the other day and decided to buy
4 prizebonds on account of this thread. Never had any before.
I'll let ye know when I win

dulpit

pigeonbutler wrote:

So it's not an investment, it's not gambling, it's a kind of bastardised child of the two.

haha, you said bastard

On topic, never won anything.. .My mother found a rake of them couple of months ago, ranging from the 60's or so up... Checked every single one to see if there was any unclaimed prizes on them, not a bit..

Drexl Spivey

I don't get it:

some of you have bonds for 20, 30 or 40 years and never won anything.
some of you regularly win 75 euros.

Doesn't make sense to me.

I have 40 bonds. I was planning on buying more but after reading that thread, I won't.

Sherifu

I think I have some somewhere but I don't know how many.

Jeff Bond wrote: »

Doesn't make sense to me.

Prizebonds are one of the oldest pyramid schemes

Flukey

Faceman wrote:

Prizebonds are no different than the lotto or those awful scratchcards!!

As has been pointed out. There are many big differences. When you buy a lotto ticket, it is only eligible for a set amount of draws. Once you buy a prizebond it goes into all draws. Even if you win something on it, it will still go into subsequent draws. I know, it has happened to me. Finally, at any time you can take back your prizebonds and cash them in, something you can't do with a lotto ticket or scratchcard.

To answer the original question, I've often won on them.

javaboy

Flukey wrote: »

To answer the original question, I've often won on them.

With a name like Flukey I should hope so.

This thread was started when we were still in boom time. It doesn't matter whether any particular form of investment has a good return anymore since we're all poor now.

Suggest this be locked until we're rich again.

kirving

dogbert_the_dog wrote: »

yes that's the same conclusion i've arrived at.
I was hoping for some sort of ironic twist of fate and a winning cheque would come through my door after posting my first message, but apparently that whole concept is a bit of a con too

It happenned to me, I was cleaning up some stuff and fround the bond thing, and asked my parents could I cash it in because I was never gonna win. The very next day, I win 100 euro on the thing!