Frequently Asked Questions

Pick a competition, choose how many tickets you want and pay at the checkout. Each ticket is a numbered entry, and if the competition has instant wins your number is revealed there and then. There is a walkthrough on How to play.

You must be 18 or over and resident in England, Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland; the Republic of Ireland is not included. We ask for your date of birth at registration, and may ask you to prove your age, identity and address before paying out. Our own people, and our suppliers and agents who work on the competitions, cannot enter.

Sometimes. Where a competition caps entries per person, the cap is on its page and applies however you entered. Entering under more than one name or account voids those entries.

Every competition here has a free postal route, whatever the ticket price, and it has exactly the same chance of winning as a paid entry. You open the same free account a paying entrant opens, because every entry number has to belong to one, then send us one handwritten postcard per entry. We also hold back enough tickets for at least the first four working days of every competition, so a postcard has time to reach us. The address and the details we need are in Schedule 1 of our Terms; please follow them exactly.

On the shortest competitions, yes. Where a competition runs for four days or less from going live to closing, there is no time for a postcard to reach us, so those competitions carry a Quick Draw tag and you can use the free phone route instead. Register online first, then call 07983644446 and give the details listed in Schedule 1 of our Terms. A ticket number is allocated to your call and emailed to you. That number is only for free entries and is not the number for general enquiries. On every other competition, please use the free postal route.

Extra prizes attached to particular ticket numbers, on top of the main prize. They are set aside before the competition opens, from tickets nobody holds yet, and we do not choose which ones carry a prize. More on Instant wins explained.

The moment you get the ticket. Some competitions show the result as a game — a wheel, a scratchcard, a reveal grid — but that only reveals a result your ticket number had already decided. Nothing you do while playing changes it.

Yes, on exactly the same footing as paid entries. If the best instant wins have already gone by the time a postal entry reaches us, that entrant receives site credit which covers a ticket in the next competition offering instant wins at least as valuable as the one they missed. It is set out in paragraph 49 of our Terms.

No. It goes into your Wallet automatically the moment the ticket is revealed, and you can spend it here straight away or withdraw it, subject to the £10 minimum below. Recent wins are on Instant winners.

Every prize here is paid as credit into your Wallet and named in cash terms — a prize called “£100 Cash” is £100 in your Wallet. You have one Wallet, fed by wins, refunds and cashback, and what is in it is real money: spend it here, or withdraw it.

Request it from your account and we pay in pounds sterling by bank transfer, to a bank account in your own name. We do not pay a third party. The minimum withdrawal is £10; a balance below that stays in your Wallet to spend here. We may ask you to verify your identity, age and address first.

Debit cards, Apple Pay and Google Pay, plus any Wallet balance, which is applied automatically at checkout. We do not accept credit cards.

A physical prize takes up to 14 days, in person or by courier, and we cover the delivery cost unless the competition page said otherwise from the start.

A Gold Ticket is a Boost: a promotion in which we increase what a particular ticket number pays if it wins. The multiplier that applies is shown against that number on the competition page, and paragraphs 50 to 55 of our Terms cover them in full.

No. A Boost does not change which numbers carry a prize, and it does not change anyone's chance of winning — only the amount a boosted number pays if it wins.

The ordinary prize is credited automatically as usual. The extra amount from the Boost is added separately and by hand: we aim to add it within 24 hours of the win, and within 5 working days in any event. A delay does not affect your entitlement to it. If 5 working days pass without it, tell us and we will put it right.

We can start, change or end a Boost at any time, but ending one never removes an amount already won. A Boost applies only where the number was shown as boosted at the time you obtained it.

By TrueNorth, the certified random number generator provided by our website platform. Each draw is committed in advance and independently verified, and the competition page shows the draw details with a link so anyone can check the result rather than take it on trust. If TrueNorth is ever unavailable we may use another established generator, such as Google's or random.org.

On the date shown on the competition page: some live on our social channels, others automatically shortly after closing. If a competition sells out early and we have chosen to draw it on sell-out, it is drawn then. Where we have not, it closes to new entries and the draw still takes place on the advertised date.

The draw still goes ahead on the published date and the prize is still awarded. We will not extend a closing date because of the level of sales, in any circumstances. We would only extend where a force majeure event, a serious technical failure or another emergency had stopped people entering.

We contact the winner personally, by email or telephone, as soon as we can. Within 7 days the result appears on the competition page: first name, surname initial and ticket number. Past winners are on Results.

A penny from every ticket sold here goes into it — every ticket, every competition, not just the winning ones. We add £50 at the start of each month, and the whole balance is given away at the end of that month, to a person or a family rather than an organisation. See the Kind Spirits Fund page.

Anyone with an account can nominate anyone, for anything, including themselves. What you have spent makes no difference and you need not have entered a competition. George and Sunny read every nomination and choose one a month.

No. It is not a charity and is not collected for the benefit of any particular charitable institution. The payments are gifts from Spooky Competitions Ltd to a person or a family.

A prize we fund ourselves. It starts each week at £20 and grows by a penny for every ticket sold that week, and one winner is drawn at random at the end of the week.

There is nothing to enter and nothing to pay. Play any competition during the week and you are in, once — ordering ten times gives exactly one entry, the same as ordering once.

Yes. In My Account, under Play Safe, set a limit per week, month or year. Lowering a limit takes effect immediately; relaxing or removing one waits 24 hours, so a decision made in the moment cannot undo a careful one.

Yes. A timeout locks your account for anything from a single day up to permanently, and once set it cannot be shortened or lifted early by anyone, including us. See Player protection, and Debt advice if money is becoming a worry.

You can delete your account from your account settings at any time. If you would like a hand, or want to know what happens to your data, contact us or read our Privacy Policy.