Premium Bonds - have you won anything?

You were lucky galty, I’ve just worked mine out and my return was 1.2%.
Still that’s better than the banks.

Please can you tell me how you work it out ?

Well you can either scroll through all your bank statements for the last 12 months to see what your total winnings are…but that might not work if you’ve paid in the NS&I cheques along with others.

Or, this is better…go to the NS&I website and log in and go to your winnings.
Tot up 12 months worth and work it out as a percentage of whatever amount of Premium Bonds you’ve got.

So for example if you’ve got £2,000 of Bonds and you’ve won £50 during the year, then your return on your £2,000 is 2½%.

Booked a cruise today Realist…:smiley:

Each to their own, but I don’t consider myself greedy by finding an IFA to advise and invest on my behalf. I also like to know that the little bit I have is there if I need it!

Thanks Ruthio .

It’s not being greedy.
At the moment keeping money in a saving account is effectively losing money as inflation is much higher than interest rates .
So for savers or those trying not to lose their savings it’s a difficult time…
Meanwhile cheap loans have caused oceans of debt for young people and made house prices rise to the stratosphere making it practically impossible for many young people today to ever own a house .
At the same time older people who put money asaide for their retirement find ther savings eroding before their eyes.

It is , I haven’t worked out mine yet .
Meanwhile smaller banks are giving better that the large ones .

Shawbrook Bank is offering 1.2% on instant access .
If the smaller banks can do it why don’t the main ones ?

Sorry Ruthio but the numbers are not as simple as this. You can’t “cherry pick” a specific point in time where you won prizes. To assess whether your premium bonds are a good or bad investment you need to do the calculation on the total number of bonds you won and crucially the total period that you have owned them in conjunction with the total amount of prizes you have won.

There is a simple calculator here that people can use:

[size=3]Premium Bonds Investment Return Calculator[/size]

http://www.invidion.co.uk/premiumBond/index.php?linker=http://www.invidion.co.uk/css/tools.css

The odds of winning a £50 prize are apparently 24000:1 so the basic odds tell me that Premium Bonds are certainly NOT a great investment. They are much like the National Lottery.
The prize money for all the basic prizes is far far too low for the odds of winning those prizes.

e.g. If it costs you £1 to place a dice bet and you win £3 every time you roll a 6,

Then the astute should immediately see that this is a “sucker bet”. On average a 6 will come up every 6th roll. So you will have paid £6 for those 6 rolls yet you only win £3. Hence it is a losing proposition.

The National Lottery odds for matching 3 numbers used to be 54 to 1 (when there were just 49 numbers) and the prize for that was a mere £10. Hence a total sucker bet.

The only prizes of any merit are the really big ones and the odds of winning one are astronomically against you.

Overall Premium Bonds exist to remove money from the element of the populous that is either lazy, or which doesn’t understand basic odds, or which are just dreamers or all of the above.

You are literally handing your cash over to a bloke you have never met so that he can go and invest your money on real prospects which will generate a good return for him whilst he gives you pretty much NOTHING back in return.

It is only the way the entire thing is wrapped up and presented that makes people think it is something else.

OMG I have just used this .
I have had some of these bonds since I was a child

My total is 1.19% :frowning:

Over how many years have you have bonds Muddy?
1.19% isn’t much of a return TBH.

Well some I have had since a child other so have not had so long
You are right that is an awful return but maybe I did it wrong .

Another win this month but ONLY £25 this time:-):slight_smile:

Just checked £50 :slight_smile:

£25 here :slight_smile:

Can’t find the original thread but happily had a little win last month £25 on one lot and £50 on another.
Putting that back in see what it brings next time.

So much better than interest rates in the banks.

I have the princely sum of … 6.

Not surprising I’ve never won a thing really though I believe one did come up trumps for a modest amount back in the mid 60’s.

I won £25 this month and £25 a few months ago! I have just over £6,000 in premium bonds.
I would rather have premium bonds than lose money betting on the Lottery.

I have £1,000 worth, and waiting for a win. Had a small one (£25? Maybe) a few years ago.

“A fool and their money are easily parted”