Our Standards
The Department for Culture, Media and Sport publishes a Voluntary Code of Good Practice for Prize Draw Operators. It sets out what a site like this one should be doing across three areas: looking after the people who play, being open about how the draws work, and taking responsibility for its own conduct.
We follow that code. We are not currently listed as a signatory to it; if that changes we will say so here rather than let you assume it.
This page sets out what we actually do, in one place, so you can check us against the code instead of taking our word for it. Where we fall short of something, or where we have taken a different route to the same end, we say so.
Looking after the people who play
Who can play
You must be 18 or over and live in the United Kingdom. We ask for your date of birth when you register and you confirm your age there. Anyone who held an account before we started asking has to add theirs before buying again. We may ask for photo ID to confirm your age, identity and address before a prize is paid out.
We do not accept credit cards
Not for any competition, and not for any amount. We have instructed our payment provider to decline them. If one ever does get through, tell us and we will refund it in full.
You can pay by debit card, or with credit already sitting in your Wallet. Apple Pay and Google Pay are accepted, but only where the card behind them is a debit card.
The code allows operators to take up to £250 a month on a credit card for ordinary draws, and none at all for instant win draws. We have chosen to take none at all, on anything. It is simpler, and there is no version of borrowing money to enter a competition that we want to be part of.
Setting your own spending limit
You can cap what you spend with us, from My Account then Play Safe. You choose the amount and whether it applies per week, per month or per year, and you do not have to give a reason. You can set it to £0, which stops you spending anything at all.
- Lowering a limit takes effect immediately.
- Raising one, removing it, or changing how often it applies waits 24 hours. That delay is deliberate. A decision made in the heat of the moment cannot be acted on in that moment.
The limit is checked at every payment, so an order that would take you past it is stopped there. Card payments count towards it; spending prize credit already in your Wallet does not, because that was never money leaving your bank.
Taking a break, or stopping
You can set a timeout on your account from My Account then Timeout. The lengths available are 1 day, 4 days, 7 days, 1 week, 2 weeks, and 1 to 6 months — or permanent. The code asks that a temporary suspension be available for at least six months; ours is, and the shorter options are there as the pause it also encourages.
Once a break is set it cannot be shortened or lifted early by anyone, including us. That is not a policy, it is how the system is built — the page you set it on says so in terms. If you ask us to end it sooner we will not be able to, however the request is put. While it runs you cannot enter and you cannot close your account, so the break holds.
You can also close your account permanently yourself, whenever you want, without asking us.
Watching for signs of trouble
We monitor how accounts are used from the day they are opened, against thresholds we set for how much spend and how many orders deserve a second look. If an account passes one, three things happen at once: you are shown a reality check asking you to look over your recent activity, you get an email, and we are told so we can get in touch.
We do not publish the figures, because we review and change them. A reality check is not an accusation and it does not restrict your account.
Where we see something that worries us we will get in touch, and we will talk you through setting your own limit or taking a break. Where we think it is necessary, we will ask for an account to be suspended.
Free, independent help
None of the organisations below are connected to us, and nothing you tell them comes back to us. For money worries: StepChange, National Debtline, Citizens Advice and MoneyHelper. If things feel heavier than money: Samaritans, free, any hour, on 116 123. Numbers and links are on our debt advice and support page, and our player protection page explains every control on your account.
How we advertise
Our marketing follows the UK advertising codes. We do not target anyone under 18. We never suggest that entering a competition is a way to solve money problems, replace a job, or make anyone financially secure. It is a competition. Treat it as one.
Anyone who promotes us on our behalf has to follow the same rules — see Anyone who promotes us below.
Being open about how it works
How the draws are done
End prize winners are drawn by TrueNorth, an independent random number generator registered to Spooky Competitions Ltd. Each draw is committed in advance and can be checked afterwards, so the result is verifiable rather than something you take on trust. Results are published on the competition page and on our results page.
Every entry has the same chance in that draw, whether it was paid for or entered free.
How instant wins are decided
The winning numbers are drawn at random by the platform, before entries open, from numbers nobody holds yet. We do not choose them. The reveal game you play afterwards — the wheel, the scratch card, whichever it is — is only the way you find out. It cannot change what your number was already worth.
A competition that hands out numbers in order rather than at random carries no instant wins at all.
Gold Ticket boosts. Separately from that, we sometimes pick particular ticket numbers and multiply what they pay. A boost never changes which numbers win and it never changes anybody's odds — it only makes a win already sitting on that number worth more. Boosted numbers are marked as boosted on the competition page before you buy.
The code asks that instant win competitions should not be the majority of what an operator runs at any one time. We hold ourselves to that: at least half of the competitions live on this site at any moment are ordinary prize draws with no instant wins in them. Our instant wins explained page goes through the whole thing properly.
Your chances
Every competition shows the total number of tickets before you enter, how many have gone, and — where there are instant wins — how many prizes there are and how many are still unclaimed. Odds quoted anywhere on this site are worked out against the full ticket count.
There is always a free way in
Every competition on this site can be entered free by post — no payment to us of any kind, just the postcard and the stamp. A free postal entry has the same chance of winning the main draw as a paid one. The route is set out in full in our terms and conditions and summarised on how to play, and it is shown before you pay, not buried after it.
Because a postcard takes time to reach us, some instant win prizes may already have been claimed by the time a free entry is registered. Our terms set out what we do about that so nobody entering free is left worse off.
Most of our competitions run long enough for the post to be a real option. Where one runs for four days or less it carries QUICK DRAW in its name, and those competitions have a free telephone entry route as well as the postal one, so a short competition never leaves you without a genuine free way in.
Prizes, and getting paid
Cash prizes are paid as credit to your Wallet, straight away and automatically. Where a number carried a Gold Ticket boost, the ordinary prize credits automatically and the extra amount from the boost is added separately, by hand: we aim to add it within 24 hours of the win, and within 5 working days in any event.
You can spend Wallet credit on more tickets, or withdraw it to your own UK bank account once you have £10 or more. A balance below that stays in your Wallet and can be spent on entries. Non-cash prizes are sent to you, or we agree a reasonable cash alternative.
A slow-selling competition is still drawn on its published date. We do not extend a competition because it is selling badly, we do not shrink a prize, and we do not cancel one for low sales. Where a competition sells out early we may draw it there and then rather than wait; the competition page tells you if that applies. A date otherwise moves only if something outside our control has stopped people entering.
Who won
Winners are published with their first name, surname initial and winning ticket number. Instant wins appear on our public instant winners list as they happen, with no minimum prize value — the small wins are listed alongside the big ones.
The two pots
A penny from every ticket sold goes into the Kind Spirits Fund, and we add £50 at the start of each month. At the end of the month we normally pay the whole balance to a person or family nominated by somebody using this site. If we receive no nomination we think is right for it, we make no payment that month and the balance carries into the next one — we do not keep it. It is not a charity and we do not describe it as one.
Separately, we put £20 into a weekly player pot at the start of each week and add a penny for every ticket sold that week. Anyone who enters any competition that week is entered once, free, and one entrant is drawn at random at the end of it.
Taking responsibility
Who we are
Spooky Competitions Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 16323850, registered office Unit 20 Ptarmigan Place, Attleborough Fields Industrial Estate, Nuneaton CV11 6RX. We are registered with the Information Commissioner's Office under reference ZB926317. It is run by George and Sunny, and there is more about them on our about page.
Checking our own work
Responsibility for everything on this page sits with George Green, the Competition Manager named in our terms. We review this page, the account settings behind it and our terms at least once a year, and straight away whenever something changes — a new kind of competition, a change of provider, or a complaint that shows something is not working. If we find we have got something wrong, we fix it and say so here.
The companies we rely on
Our site runs on the RaffleX platform. Draws use TrueNorth. Card payments are handled by Cashflows, so your card details go to them and not to us.
Anyone who promotes us
We run a referral scheme. Anyone taking part has to accept our referral terms before their link works, and those terms require them to follow this code — in particular the advertising rules above. If someone promoting us breaks them, we withhold the reward and switch their link off. Nobody may advertise this site in a way we would not be allowed to advertise it ourselves.
If we get it wrong
Our complaints procedure is published in full. We aim to respond within three working days. Where we need longer, we tell you why and when you can expect a full response. If you are still unhappy, you can get free independent advice from Citizens Advice or your local Trading Standards service at any point.
Anything else
If something on this page is not matched by what you actually experience here, we want to know before anyone else does. Email [email protected] and it will reach us, not a call centre.
You can read the code itself on GOV.UK.