More Questions Of Comping
Thanks for all of your questions following my first ‘Question of Comping’ article. I’ll try to answer as many of your queries as I can, but I’m already starting to build up a backlog so please be patient. Sometimes, a series of questions on a similar topic can inspire an entire article (October’s piece on till receipts came about as a result of your questions, for example), so your input really does help. Do please keep those questions coming!
Why do some competitions have such pedantic rules? How strict are judges at actually adhering to them?
The number one rule in comping is… stick to the rules!
Some Terms & Conditions are clearly ‘cut and paste’ jobs from previous promotions. Others may have been included following legal or industry guidelines - but without any thought being given to whether they’re actually suitable or relevant to a particular promotion. But unless there are glaring mistakes or inconsistencies such as contradicting addresses or closing dates (in which case Compers News will always try to find out the ‘true’ picture if time allows), we must work on the assumption that each rule is there for a purpose – and stick to it.
If the instructions tell us to ‘write’ our details, then write them we must. If a particular type of pen or ink colour is stipulated, then again be sure to do as you’re told (in this case, although it sounds petty, the promoter may be using scanners to automatically ‘read’ entries and so the type and colour of your writing will be important). Plain paper should mean exactly that – not coloured or lined, but plain white paper. If the rules refer to a ‘stamped’ envelope, use a stamp rather than the office franking machine (some promoters equate a franked entry with a potential ‘bulk’ entry, and so may disqualify it). A particular size of paper, asking for an SAE for no apparent reason… I’m sure you can think of plenty of other examples of seemingly petty rules, but it’s best to always try to stick to them.
For example, you may remember those “all of your money back in ten years time” –type offers that were fashionable a few years ago. These promotions had deliberately daunting terms and conditions, and depended on customers forgetting to claim several years down the line, or failing to read the small print and thus invalidating their claims. Some of the more outlandish reasons for refusing claims included the required ball point pen not being used, the wrong kind of post being used (one actually stipulated second class recorded delivery, for example), prohibited attachments being sent with the claim form – even if this was just a covering letter, forms being folded incorrectly, addresses not being copied and even punctuated precisely on outer envelopes… I could go on, but will instead simply emphasise that on average, less than 10% of claims in these types of promotion ever reached the payout stage. Hopefully there are no competition promoters out there deliberately setting these kind of traps to keep their workload down (well, OK, I’m fairly convinced that there’s one but my lips remain sealed on legal advice!), but you can solve any potential problems by ensuring that you stick rigidly to the rules – however nonsensical, petty, or downright pointless they may seem.
How much grace does a promoter usually give after a closing date, to allow for delays etc.?
The closing date of a competition must always be considered sacrosanct. Whilst the odd promoter or handling house might add on a day or two to cover possible postal delays and the like, you should always work on the basis that this will NOT happen. Indeed, a promoter could find themselves in trouble if a closing date was extended without good reason. So always make sure that your entries arrive in plenty of time, and build in a few days yourself to cover potential delays.
Bear in mind too that some of the larger handling houses will have their own internal systems which your precious entry may need to work its way through – so allow time for that. Better to be safe than sorry, so I always allow a minimum of three working days for a first class letter, and a week for second class or Freepost. I always allow a further day where possible if my entry needs to go to a particular person or department number within the organisation, and yet another day if the address is a P O Box number (the post office might not service these every day). And if a closing date falls on a Saturday, Sunday or Monday, always pretend that it’s the preceding Friday. Most business mail services – and the handling houses themselves – grind to a halt at weekends. Of course, few of us are this organised and many of us have won prizes with entries posted at the very last minute. But it’s always best to make sure that your entry will arrive on time without having to trust to luck or the vagaries of the Royal Mail – and ALWAYS work on the basis that a closing date is set in stone!
Are all of the £1.50 phone scratch card competitions a con?
It’s wrong to call them a ‘con’, otherwise they wouldn’t be allowed to operate. They are legal – just! – but you must remember that most existing comping law was written long before things like premium rate phone lines, scratch cards, text messages, instant wins etc. even existed.
Thankfully the law is currently being reviewed, and we’re promised major changes soon. Until then, my recommendation is simply to avoid these things at all costs. And if you are tempted, read the small print extremely carefully. First of all, have you actually ‘won’? If there is any reference to you having to ‘return the winning number’, then chances are your number is not the ‘winning’ number – despite what the extremely wordy letter or gamecard may imply. A ‘guaranteed entitlement’ should also be avoided. You’re ‘entitled’ to buy a lottery ticket whenever you like, but it doesn’t mean that you’ll win anything with it! If, despite your best endeavours wrestling with the small print, it looks like you have actually won a prize, then look very closely again at the rules. It should become clear which ‘prize’ you’ve most likely won, what strings are attached (there will undoubtedly be many!), and how much it’s going to cost you.
Try to think laterally when you look at the promoter’s claims, be unashamedly pessimistic and consider the worst case scenario of every possible prize. OK, so £1,000 cash sounds good and doesn’t leave much room for doubt – which is why it’s a fairly safe bet that you haven’t won this! But a £1,000 ‘award’, ‘gift voucher’, ‘prize certificate’ or ‘cash value’ should set the alarm bells ringing. A family holiday to Florida with £500 spending money? Nice! A ‘trip to Europe’ (probably for one person, to an unspecified destination, by coach, in the middle of the night, on a wet Wednesday in November, departing from the other end of the country on payment of the necessary ‘processing fee’…)? Not quite so attractive! A ‘gift cheque’ will most likely bear no resemblance to a real cheque, a ‘gift voucher’ will have nothing to do with well known high street stores, ‘state of the art kitchen equipment’ will probably be more at the plastic pastry-cutter end of the scale, and a ‘hi-tech micro technology hi-fi audio accessory’ will doubtless be a cheap radio. There are many more examples, but I’m sure you get the idea!
So use your common sense and don’t be tempted. If it looks too good to be true then it probably is – an old, old adage in the world of comping, but something you’ll be wise to never forget. I know that this is stating the obvious to most people reading this, but it does make me angry how these promotions can get away with targeting the more vulnerable and trusting people in our society – usually the very people who can least afford to lose £1.50 a minute! And as for the seemingly reputable magazines and newspapers that give these things an air of respectability by distributing them with their own publications in return for a few pieces of silver (whilst shamelessly decrying the very same “evil scams” in their news pages every so often), they should be ashamed of themselves too. But hopefully the law will be changing soon.
And on that jolly note… Merry Christmas! Don’t forget to get all of those December entries done early, and have a great time.
I hope you have a happy, healthy and prosperous new year too – with lots of prizes in 2004!
Smid x
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