§ Mr. Gordon PrenticeTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he will include on his website the numbers of all premium bonds where prizes are unclaimed. [34742]
§ Mrs. LiddellThe information requested falls with the responsibility of the Chief Executive of National Savings. I have asked him to arrange for a reply to be given.
Letter from Peter Bareau to Mr. Gordon Prentice, dated 24 March 1998:
Thank you for your question about publishing on the Internet the numbers of all Premium Bonds where prizes are unclaimed.Premium Bond holders do not have to claim their prizes - National Savings automatically writes to all winners. However, there are cases where Premium Bond holders move house and forget to notify National Savings of their new address. In these cases National Savings endeavours to find their new address. If not found after 18 months, the winning Bond numbers are put on to National Savings' "unclaimed prize" list and published in the Supplement to the London Gazette, which is updated quarterly. Copies of this publication are held at main post offices in the UK.There is no limit for recovering these prizes - National Savings will always honour payment when the Premium Bond holder's new address is established.123WTo offer better customer service and convenience, National Savings is now planning to include a searchable database of these unclaimed prizes on its new Web site. The new site is currently being developed, and it is hoped that it will go live in May 1998.
§ Mr. Gordon PrenticeTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer what is the value of unclaimed premium bond prizes(a) by English county and Welsh and Scottish unitary authority and (b) in total; and how much of this total accrued in the last 12 months. [34746]
§ Mrs. LiddellThe information requested falls with the responsibility of the Chief Executive of National Savings. I have asked him to arrange for a reply to be given.
Letter from Peter Bareau to Mr. Gordon Prentice, dated 24 March 1998:
Thank you for your question about the value of unclaimed Premium Bond prizes. The information you requested is set out below.National Savings current computer systems can not provide a breakdown of unclaimed Premium Bond Prizes by individual English counties, or Welsh and Scottish Unitary authorities. However, the information is available by region and is set out in the following table:
Region Total Value (£) Avon Dorset Glos Somerset Wilts 720,000 Bedfordshire Cambridgeshire 270,000 Berkshire Bucks Oxfordshire 550,000 Channel Isles Cornwall Devon 360,000 Cheshire 300,000 Cleveland Cumbria Durham North Tyne andWear 530,000 Derbyshire Staffordshire 290,000 Essex 440,000 Foreign Addresses 960,000 Hampshire Isle of Wight 440,000 Herefordshire Shropshire Worcs 190,000 Hertfordshire 310,000 Kent 410,000 Isle of Man Lancs Merseyside 1,100,000 Sth Humberside Leics Lincs Notts 480,000 Greater London 3,800,000 Norfolk Suffolk 260,000 Northamptonshire 98,000 Nth Humberside Yorks (Nth Sth West) 830,000 Scotland 1,100,000 Surrey 430,000 Sussex (East and West) 430,000 Northern Ireland 210,000 Wales 600,000 West Midlands Warwickshire 690,000 Total value of unclaimed prizes 15,800,000 124W
Premium Bond holders do not have to claim their prizes— National Savings automatically writes to all winners. However, there are times when Premium Bond holders move house and forget to notify National Savings of their new address. In these cases National Savings endeavours to find their new address. If not found after 18 months, the winning Bond numbers are put on to National Savings' "unclaimed prize" list and published in the Supplement to the London Gazette, which is updated quarterly and is held at main post offices in the UK.The total unclaimed prizes accrued in the last 12 months is £1.2 million. Because of the 18 months before a prize is deemed "unclaimed", this relates to prizes drawn during the period August 1995 to August 1996.Over the 40 year life of the Premium Bond Scheme, the total value of prizes paid out has been £3.9 billion. The current amount unclaimed represents less than half of one per cent. of that total.