Premium bonds

[JustMe9]

Are premium bonds worth it? How much have you got and how much have you won? Im thinkibg about buying some:) how does it all work? Is there only 1 chance a month for 1 person to win or can you win multiples?:)

I had another £25 today, as did DH and DM! Our investments range from £4K upwards!

Are you all looking online? If I log into my Nsandi account, it says that the next results are due today, so I would have thought that I should be able to see them now?

Do they email you if you have won? I know that it's unlikely that I will have won, even though everyone else with a similar amount to me seems to win all the time, but having never won anything, I don't know what happens if you do win.

If you go on the prize checker and type in your holders number it will tell you what you've won. You do get an email but I never receive them until the 3/4/5 of the month.

There’s an app.

Like this

We've got the max amount in them, and win £25 most months, but nothing bigger than £50 so far and that's only happened a couple of times.

It's really hard to know what's best but we like the element of a potential win with it.... more chances than with the lottery, I guess.

Thanks, have done the prize checker online and haven't won.

I had a couple of thousand for donkeys years, and although £25 came up a few times, the overall return was far less than 1%.

I’ve recently added 20K because I’m looking after it for a relative, who may need it at some point so it needs to be risk free and easy access. If not needed in their lifetime it will become an inheritance. It will be interesting to see if it generates a better return.

Interest rates are so low right now that I've decided to buy some premium bonds. It's hard to get 1% or more in a savings account now, unless you lock the money up in a bond for a year or more, which I don't want to do, as I feel that rates will rise next year. The total prize fund is 1% from December, and although there's no guarantee of winning a prize, from what I've read online it seems that if you have a large holding of say, several thousand pounds, you have a reasonable chance of winning prizes equal to 1% interest, so I have bought £1,000 and might buy some more when my redundancy payment arrives.

I had an old £2 bond which my parents bought me when I was a child, which I registered in my married name a few years back. I registered online and was issued with a Holder's number. So, will my new investment have the same Holder's number? I'm confused about how the actual draw works - if each £1 invested counts as a single bond, how does this work when a single holder's number covers the whole lot? I understand that the more bonds you have, the more chances you have to win, but can't quite compute the mechanics of having, in theory, 1002 chances to win, when the only allocate one number for all my bonds. I'm probably being a bit dense - please could someone explain?

Also, I'd be pleased to hear from anyone who has had luck in the draws.

@Defenbaker Each bond is entered in to the draw separately. So if you have £1002 you have 1002 chances of winning. There are various prizes to be won.

Yes, that's the way I understand it to work, I'm just confused as to the details.

Years ago each bond certificate had a unique number, in the same way that raffle tickets have indivual numbers. It just seems weird that in theory someone could have 50,000 bonds, all with the same number attached.

Newspapers used to print lists of the winning numbers each month, but now that list would probably be several pages long, so it's all online. I'm so last century.

@Defenbaker You have a holders number and then each individual bond has a unique number too. These are how the winners are shown:

August 2019 I bought £3000 in won £75 up to April this year. In april I upped it to £15000 and I've won £25 a month since bar one month where I won £75. I like premium bonds, it's a bit of fun without spending actual money. I'm happy as long as I make more then I'd earn in interest

I've got quite a lot but have never won more than £25 a time, and not every month either. Some people on here have been very fortunate with multiple big wins or winning most months. Unfortunately so far I've not be one of them but I haven't given up hope that a big win might come my way one day. As they've just reduced the prize pot and the number of prizes that day might be a long time coming!

@ExclamationPerfume Thanks for explaining, that makes sense.

@Redwolf1 - from doing some rough sums in my head, it seems that you've gained more in prize money than you would have gained in interest. Nice result. For me, it's a safe place to park some money, in the hope of a prize, until interest rates rise. Like playing the lottery, but you don't lose your stake money.

Maximum holdings here. I win most months, sometimes several prizes.

I won my first 25.
I'm so thrilled! Lovely photos of a lady with a sparkler.
So much better than the flat.... You have not won anything..
Interest rates on stocks and shares isa though much better!!

Due won 2t twice in a row after immediately taking them out.

I bought 25 quid just for the fun of the monthly reveal on the app. I might add a bit more.

Odds of winning calculator here

In the DM today NS&I explain that the draw works the other way round :
ERNIE comes up with a random list of letters and numbers which are then allocated to individual prizes. These numbers are then matched to premium bond numbers and paired up. Makes no difference to who wins or not but thought it was interesting.

One plus point for me is that I find them very easy to buy through the site while doing banking (popping the odd few quid into them to add to savings) but would also be able to transfer back to usable cash quite quickly if needed, unlike many types of savings account.

Years ago each bond certificate had a unique number, in the same way that raffle tickets have indivual numbers. It just seems weird that in theory someone could have 50,000 bonds, all with the same number attached

The bonds still have individual numbers, if someone bought a block of 50000 bonds, they would have 50000 sequential numbers. On my list of bonds, it gives the numbers as 376TF261324 to 376TF261348 for the block, for example.

You can see lists of the top prize winners on the NS&I website.

www.nsandi.com/prize-checker/winners

I like to look out for the big winners who bought £5 of bonds in 1976 or similar.

I don't have a high holding at all, but have already made 5% this year, which is a lot better than I would get anywhere else.

DH and I have £50,000 each and win between £25 and £100 each almost every month.