PREMIUM BONDS MARCH ONWARDS

[Blondeshavemorefun]

New thread and I've been asked to give some basic info. Feel free to add stuff

PB have been about since 1957

Been 30yrs (April 2024) since a million was then the highest prize

nsandi-corporate.com/news-research/news/30-years-premium-bonds-ps1-million-jackpots#

Each bond is £1. You have to buy in minimum of £25 so means 25 chances to win every purchase - years ago you could buy £1 at a time.

Odds of winning £1 million on Premium Bonds at face value are 1 in 2,489,469,818 if you have £25 in PBs.

However most people have more than £25 so the odds depend on how much you do hold.

If you have £100 the odds in any given month are 1 in 49,563,028

£1,000 in PB the odds are 1 in 4,954,991

£50,000 in PB the odds are 1 in 96,839

To win anything odds are 1 in 22000

So providing you have more than £100 you have better odds than winning the lottery 😄

And obviously far better than the lottery - you don’t lose your stake !!!!!!

Bonds have to be in for a clear month before going into the draw

If you want to cash bonds in then usually takes 3 days to go into your account

Winnings can be reinvested if holdings are under £50k

This means they will go into the next months draw without losing a month

Or sent to named bank account if winnings take over FH /want winnings in bank account

More info here

www.moneyhelper.org.uk/en/savings/types-of-savings/premium-bonds

The best time to buy premium bonds is on the last day of the month, as this means they are only held by NSI for one month and one day, without being entered into the prize draw.

PB to me is the fun and thrill each month of what if I win big and a millionaire - to then hoping win thousands to a day or two later being grateful if win £25😂

I have nowhere near the maximum and probably never will unless I win £50k + on pb

But only takes one £1 to win that million !!!

I love seeing the low holdings win high amounts

We've seen over the years £100 win £100k and £50 win £25k and even £1 won £10k

Maximum is £50k per person so some do have all for family- mum dad and 2 kids so £200k etx

Those on the thread are varying from few hundred /few thousand - to 20/30k to full holdings of £50k

Everyone is welcome to join in whether small or full holdings

One would expect if had full holdings of £50k to win something every month and think over the year to earn the same as if in a high interest account to win around £1925 in prizes

If have £5k average luck is £175 winnings a year

Obviously some people have better 'luck' than others and some worse - Ie full holdings and not winning anything a month or two or even longer

PB odds calculator below

moneymarvel.co.uk/calculators/premium-bonds/

Or this one is quite good as shows the interest rate of the winnings - obv anything over 4% is good as if in an account you wouid be taxed so be more like 3%)

In August 2023, NS&I hiked the prize fund to a 24-year high of 4.65 per cent from 4 per cent, a level not seen since 1999 🙀🙀🙀🙀

But it has been steadily falling since, and of January 2025, the prize fund rate - the amount of the total fund paid out in prizes - is 4 per cent (www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/saving/article-14127405/Premium-Bonds-prize-fund-rate-cut-NS-deals-blow-savers.html)

www.candidmoney.com/calculators/national-savings-premium-bond-calculator

From google (august 2023) - The consistent winners are the 1.16 million people who have the maximum £50,000.

They hold almost half of all premium bonds and, at current odds of 1/22000 can expect a monthly stream of tax-free prizes: two a month and three almost every other month, 28 or 29 a year totaling £1,925

From google (Jan 2024) Tho equally With Premium Bonds, for every person who wins £1 million, a lot of people have to win nothing. So the median average will always be lower than the mean average.

This means that, with average luck, most people will win less than the prize rate each year, regardless of how many bonds they hold

To work out your own personal % rate

Take your total prizes, divide it by the number of months and x by 12.

Then divide that figure into your total holding and x 100.

So say £500 prizes in 6 months / 6 x 12 = £1000.

Holdings £30,000 = 1000/30000 x 100 = 3.33% interest rate.

But many on here do have £50k and then consider moving it to an account that pays 4% if their bonds aren't doing very well as would then def get extra money

But remember savings /interest get taxed

PB and their winnings don't

So anything over 3% in winnings is considered good.

So they do dither whether to pull out from pb and put in high interest account if not winning anything so that they will def earn x amount of interest

But then lose the what if won a million or £100k

If you have PB but not sure if you have ever won esp if moved about a lot

you can write to NS&I. Include these details in the letter:

	Current name

	Current address

	Premium Bond holder number 

	All previous addresses where you might have registered bonds

	Your signature 

You can send your letter to:

NS&I,
Sunderland
SR43 2SB.

There are 2 apps afaik

Cream - prize checker and if won previous month will show a pic - which we all get excited over 😂😂😂

Blue - the app its self works but the showing early often doesn't work for me but those who reinvest their winnings say it shows if won the day before app shows 🙀🙀🙀

Seems the higher the winnings the earlier it shows and can be from 6pm the night before the app shows

And to confuse things I have a White app that is a bookmark - which shows info/list 😄😄😄

Now this has been debated on MANY times but seems to be correct

When do we find out if going to get a visit from AM 😂

The two winners of 
the £1million prizes will be contacted by Agent Million (AM) 😂😂 the day before the first working day of the corresponding month.

There may however be 
exceptions to this, such as when the first working day of the month is a 
bank holiday, for example.

So

Day before first working day - Millionaire knock /call

First day of working month - list showing all winners million to £1k winners - which I always put up for those who can't find it

Day after first working day , including weekends - cream app showing all winnings

You can also check to see if have won via this link with your holders number

www.nsandi.com/prize-checker

Hopefully I've covered everything

Good luck one and all 😄

Excellent, Hope you win again today😀

@Blondeshavemorefun

They must do the draw somewhere near the end of the month. It's the only way it can work! They probably have predetermined dates throughout the year but just release the results on the 1st working day.

If AM ever visits me I'll have lots of questions!! 😂😂

Why not? AM 1 and 2 are out on their visits, does it matter if the list of big winners becomes available simultaneously?

I’d love to be AM, what a job! Although it says they can’t even tell colleagues, that would be almost impossible surely?

Nothing for me on the blue app, but I think it’s always been after 10pm before I’ve seen any winnings before. I have another £2000 eligible for this draw as have decided to save some mortgage overpayments in premium bonds for a year and then withdraw them to pay off a bit more of the mortgage, so keeping my fingers crossed!

@bumcake

If the list is out before AM visits, the winners could already know - as they could check their bond numbers. It would make a personal visit rather unnecessary.

Agree that it would be a great job to have!

my FOI says different

I have liaised with the colleague responsible for sourcing this
information, and they have informed me that the two respective winners of
the £1million prizes will be contacted by Agent Million the day before the
first working day of the corresponding month. There may however be
exceptions to this, such as when the first working day of the month is a
bank holiday, for example.

1. Please confirm the usual day/date of the Premium Bonds prize draw (eg

last working day/first working day etc

There is no set date for when the Premium Bonds prize draw takes place,
but time is factored in to allow for all necessary checks to be completed
ahead of the public announcement of winners on our website, made by the
second working day of each calendar month.

It definitely does matter. NS&I don’t want you finding out you’ve won a huge life-changing amount of money (a million pounds) by looking at the list.

I’ve resisted the list today - ready for midnight. Glad you popped up Phase with your AM wisdom - I love your detective work. Plus Blondes of course!

I think I did the foi several threads ago! Same debate came up 😀

list is available at midnight on the first working day of month and 1st of month if not a weekend

usually as my phone goes to 00.00 tho sometimes page takes a minute or so to refresh

I guess if takes 20mins for all the numbers/winners to be drawn via Ernie and there are 5 million 911 thousand , 996 prizes in April roughly

if must be like not even a millisecond for the first two to be drawn as the millionaires

list is ready at midnight online and around 19 300 winners

which I guess can be worked out by Ernie in seconds

if can do nearly 6 million in 20 mins

so maybe they are drawn literally as the clock strikes 12 and list
available seconds later for the 19k prizes up to £1k

can you tell I have been thinking about this LOTS

Or ignore all I said as @Phase2 said AM visits the day before the list is up

soooooooooo

means thr draw can’t be at beginning of month then and has to be month before if first working day is a Monday

head explodes even more

For those of you checking reinvested prizes on the blue app, I think they get put on in size of prize order, so a £500 prize will appear earlier than a £25 pound one.

A couple of months ago I looked at the blue app later on in the evening and it showed a reinvented prize amount of £100 so that's what I thought I'd won. I had actually won 2 x £25 prizes as well but these weren't showing at that time. They appeared on the blue and cream apps when I looked the next day.

Hello, I found you all again!

Well no Agent William here but we can still hope.

Found you. Have been thinking you were all quiet this month but I was on the wrong thread.
Looking forward to midnight but after my zero win on FH in February, I am more wary now !
I just want to retire, is that too much to ask?

I got zero on FH last month and my first ever draw. Hoping for better luck this time.

Yes I agree! We tested this a few threads ago, and the larger amounts started appearing maybe from 6pm onwards , tapering down.

Can I set my app to.reinvest even though I have FH

Reinvestment at FH happens automatically because you’re not allowed to have more than £50K in bonds.

I know but I set it to pay into a bank account. If I set it to auto invest, would it then appear on the app earlier, but then still paid into a bank account?

Don’t know about that, but hopefully someone here who has FH can help.

£500 showing reinvested for DS today. It's been a year since I bought his bonds and this has just put him up to a 10% return. Very happy with that. Sadly my own bonds are not doing so well!

@ThisUniqueDreamer

No you can’t reinvest with FH so you won’t get the choice.

Interested to know why you would want to? Just so you could possibly see winnings a couple of hours earlier?

You can't autoreinvest at FH as you are already at the maximum. Autoreinvest means to buy more bonds with your winnings. You can't do that if you already have FH.