Wow! Last minute competition for fans of In The Night Garden - LOOK!

[OliviaMumsnet]

We know this is last minute but we also know how much you love INTG so Have a look
Good luck
MNHQ

Aahhh, I'm mesmerized by the ninky nonk...ds lurves makka pekka and I like the whoohaas!

Done, thanks for the link.

CSWS, it appears that some people have been told already that they have won

From what I can work out, the closing date is today - doesn't say what time, could have been 9am or midday, doesn't have to mean end of play - and winners will be notified BY tomorrow at the latest. So if people have been notified today - and I'm not on duty so can't say for sure - then that sounds about right.

It says:

To enter, simply send your name, address and contact number to the following email address [email protected] by Tuesday 24th July 2007 at 5pm.

it says that closing is 5pm today in your small print at the bottom

Meant to say, doesn't say what time in main body of rules - does say 5pm next to where to send your email to. Hmm. No doubt Olivia will have definite answer, she is the competitions queen.

If they had selected at least some winners by mid-day today, surely that means not everyone has an equal chance of winning? Strikes me as odd, to say the least.

Hi everyone

Sorry for any confusion. I've just spoken to the competition host.

As you may know, we normally organise the entry of our competitions via Mumsnet Towers (e.g. send us a review or add an entry to Mumsnet Local) but this was a last minute request (with a very time sensitive prize) and as we know how much you love ITNG, we decided to go with it.

Anyway, what happened was simple human error and someone with a big launch party to plan was trying to tick things off their to-do list. She sent out the emails a couple of hours early.

As for those on the thread who were worried that it's not kosher, we can assure you that the email address that was set up for the competition will be deleted and that your personal data will be destroyed.

Trust this puts your minds at rest.
We'll certainly be asking for more In the Night Garden to make up for it (strictly run by MNHQ this time!)

Any queries, please drop me a line at olivia at mumsnet dot com.
Thanks
MNHQ

But if she sent out the mails early, then the winners were chosen before loads of us had entered! I think that as compensation, all of us who entered after they had selected should be sent a small ITNG goody!

Just had a mail from Hamleys saying the beanies i ordered are arriving tomorrow!

its stil not right though. they ended it early meaning that not everyone who entered it had a chance of winiing at all! I can't be the only one thats realy annoyed by that surely?

Hear, hear, MOM and can'tsleep. It's all very well for Hamleys or their PR company or whatever to say it was an error, but it's a fairly major error if you choose the winners before the competition has closed, as the BBC, ITV, Ch4 and Ch5 have just discovered.

So what are they going to do about it?

I agree edam, I also think its out of order. Also makes you wonder if they selected a winner/s fairly or just decided to go with the 1st entry they got their hands on...

they didn't select fairly as they selected before the deadline so anyone who entered round about the same time as i did y'day didn't have a chancein hel of winning.

its one thing not to win a comp but another to enter in good faith and find out they ended it early because they had other things to do

can't believe how hacked off i am about this, early pg hormones not helping prob!

and tbh I think mnhq's answer was poor as well.....Surely they are there to fight our corner..?

"Anyway, what happened was simple human error and someone with a big launch party to plan was trying to tick things off their to-do list. She sent out the emails a couple of hours early."

So that makes it ok? Did they have those people on the winners list right from the start then if emails were ready to be sent?

"As for those on the thread who were worried that it's not kosher, we can assure you that the email address that was set up for the competition will be deleted and that your personal data will be destroyed."

OK so the email address was real but the competition wasn't fair

and...we have to trust mnhq to ensure our dtails are destroyed... LOL, they couldn't even guarantee our entry into the comp so not confident on that point..

AND ITNG is a BBC programme - I thought the Beeb were hanging their heads in shame while flagellating themselves precisely because they've been running dodgy, unfair competitions? And now they go and do this. And just shrug their shoulders 'oh well, someone was busy'. Shows you just how serious all the apologies about deliberate deception were. They faked Blue Peter, Children in Need and Comic Relief FFS, how low can you get?

who 'owned' the comp? was it the Beeb? Or Hamleys?

Don't care, it's a Beeb programme, if they've contracted someone else to run the competition, they are still ruddy responsible for standards and ensuring it is run fairly particularly in current circs.

mason-williams is a PR company, not sure what that means.

I really think Olivia should be fighting this for us though, or at least with us

their tagline is Sparking a reaction....got that right lol!

website

The bloke looks like he's doing a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge poo

mom and edam I agree. I think its shocking and especially as mn seem to have washed their hands of it.

Yeah sure it was a free comp and didn't cost us anything to enter it (unlike phone lines etc) thats not the issue. Its the principle of the thing.

Had I known then I wouldn't have wasted my fecking time typing an email.

My solution: all those that entered (what ever the time) get a free mini itng toy. .