The People’s Postcode Lottery legacy
People’s Postcode Lottery supports good causes!
When it was first introduced 24 years ago, the Postcode Lottery didn’t inspire much confidence among the players but Dutch company Novamedia BV turned it into a very popular game. The lottery started in the Netherlands and gradually expanded over borders, with one of the latest and most successful games being now held in Great Britain. It is known as the People’s Postcode Lottery and in addition to making many new millionaires, it also made generous contribution totaling in excess of €5 billion to various charities.
What makes the People’s Postcode Lottery special?
While all lotteries have a percentage of the revenue generated by selling tickets, the People’s Postcode Lottery awards 40p of each £2 it sells to charitable organizations. It works through various trusts such as, Postcode Culture Trust, People’s Postcode Trust or the Postcode Green Trust to sponsor children, wildlife, museums and even to award grants. These trusts were established in subsequent years and the People’s Postcode Lottery promises to set up new ones as the games gain even more traction.
The People’s Postcode Lottery runs the game exclusively in Great Britain, but the other lotteries in the group activate all over Europe. There are a couple of prominent people supporting the association, with names such as Kaye Adams, Aggie MacKenzie, Dame Elle MacArthur or Mark Beaumont act as ambassadors for their cause. Some of them present the winners with the checks, others support the People’s Postcode Lottery and run various campaigns on its behalf.
The threat posed by scam artists
The People’s Postcode Lottery has been around for long enough to be regarded as a trustworthy venture, although the manner in which the prizes are won are slightly different. Players sign up and pay a monthly subscription, and then receive tickets for each of the five draws and have the chance of winning prizes every day. These are awarded based on the postal code, hence the name of the lottery and range from £10,000 to £100,000 and even a £2 million that is shared between people living in the same postcode area. The largest amount that a single player can hope to win is limited at £400,000.
The name of the lottery makes it suspect to those who haven’t heard of it before but are well aware of the plethora of scams that are carried out over the Internet. For scam artists, the name of this lottery is a godsend, because they can make wild claims about awarding huge jackpots based on nothing more than the postal code. They run similar scams using allegedly winning email addresses, and they benefit from the credibility that the People’s Postcode Lottery has earned over the years. By contrast, the genuine lottery has only to lose and goes to great lengths to condemn these culprits and expose them for what they are.
