According to a recent article in the Bournemouth Echo, the date for the draw has been set to 18 December. As per the terms and conditions of the competition, a cash prize will be awarded to the winner instead of the property. The cash prize will be "around £40,000", well short of the value of the property prize.

The latest statement on the Sandbanks Life website on 12 October, suggests that the organisers have spent this time corresponding with the Commission to confirm they carry out the draw without fear of reprisal:

"Frustratingly, [their latest reply] appears to have been drafted in such a way as to be ambiguous, indicating on the one hand that they do not intend to take any action 'currently' in terms of our competition being an illegal lottery, whilst at the same time reserving the right to take action against us at an unspecified future date.

We have therefore had no choice but to ask our solicitor to ask the Commission to remove the ambiguity as without such action, we are currently at risk of prosecution after concluding the draw."

The competition required players to answer questions on the site correctly to qualify for the prize. While Poole-based Vivid Construction Ltd, the organisers of the competition, felt confident this satisfied the requirements of a skill-based prize competition, the Commission had so far not provided any clear confirmation to this effect.

According to the Bournewouth Echo article, a spokesman for Vivid said the latest delay was down to taking "further advice regarding the issue of ex gratia / goodwill refunds to determine whether it would affect the legitimacy of the competition".

The cash prize will be calculated by taking the proceeds from all the entry fees minus 20% "to cover the promoters' costs and expenses". Based on a cash prize of £40,000, this suggests around 1,920 tickets were sold overall. One factor that could have affected sales was that players could not pay for their entries electronically on the site.

We will keep you posted on the results as soon as they are announced officially. In the meantime, click to read the full article on the Bournemouth Echo.

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18 December

Looks like the draw is finally happening tomorrow

Interesting comment left on their site last week (11 Dec):

"It is a great shame that actions by the Gambling Commission at the time in respect of other competitions and the subsequent battle to clear the way for our competition and the draw has meant that we did not get enough entries to award the house as a prize - but certainly one person is about to be made very happy."

I remember seeing the Devon competition stopped and thinking the same might happen to this one. I guess 40k isn't a bad prize overall for xmas!

I'll be interested to see what the prize is for the Win a New Life competition, I read they want to take it to Hollywood.

ted , December 17, 2009

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