Mapped: The place £100m of Premium Bond prizes stay unclaimed

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Your help makes all of the distinction. Learn extra Hundreds of thousands of Premium Bonds holders are sitting on money prizes value as much as £100,000 which they're but to say, new knowledge has revealed.

There are greater than £100m value of prizes going unclaimed, the newest figures from Nationwide Financial savings & Investments (NS&I) reveals, marking the primary time the determine has tipped over the brink.

Throughout all areas of the UK, there are 2,598,139 unclaimed prizes, starting from the bottom quantity of £25 to 11 jackpots of £100,000.

The area with the best variety of unclaimed prizes is the South East, with 389,713 value £14,996,600. Nonetheless, it's London that holds the best worth in unclaimed prizes, with £15,338,425 cut up between 386,616 prizes.

Premium Bonds are an funding product run by the government-owned NS&I. Every month, hundreds of thousands of savers are entered right into a draw to win tax-free money prizes starting from £25 to £1m, with two millionaires made at each draw.

There at the moment are 24 million individuals collaborating within the scheme, with greater than £127bn banked. These financial savings don’t accrue curiosity as with common financial institution accounts, however are put up in opposition to a random digital prize picker referred to as “Ernie” – the Digital Random Quantity Indicator Gear.

The primary reason behind the unpaid prizes is that round one in 10 are nonetheless paid by cheque, that are despatched to the handle given by the account holder. Whereas the most-chosen choice is a direct financial institution switch, this nonetheless meant there have been round 600,000 cheques despatched out in July alone.

<img src="https://static.independent.co.uk/2023/06/30/16/88b85ca917c0dd43581bc781a57d7c04Y29udGVudHNlYXJjaGFwaSwxNjg4MjIzODgz-2.30020024.jpg" srcset="https://static.independent.co.uk/2023/06/30/16/88b85ca917c0dd43581bc781a57d7c04Y29udGVudHNlYXJjaGFwaSwxNjg4MjIzODgz-2.30020024.jpg?quality=75&width=320&auto=webp 320w, https://static.independent.co.uk/2023/06/30/16/88b85ca917c0dd43581bc781a57d7c04Y29udGVudHNlYXJjaGFwaSwxNjg4MjIzODgz-2.30020024.jpg?quality=75&width=640&auto=webp 640w" loading="lazy" alt="People can see if they have unclaimed prizes by using the NS&I app" class="sc-1mc30lb-0 ggpMaE inline-gallery-btn"/> open picture in gallery

Folks can see if they've unclaimed prizes through the use of the NS&I app (PA Media) Prizes are thought of to be unclaimed after 18 months in keeping with NS&I, and might be collected regardless of how way back they have been received. Due to this, the variety of unclaimed prizes has progressively gathered over time.

The financial savings financial institution explains that many of the unclaimed prizes have been received by account holders who haven't registered their particulars, or have moved with out updating them.

Premium Bonds account holders can use NS&I’s on-line prize checker or prize checker app to search out out if they've any unclaimed prizes.

A spokesperson stated for NS&I: “NS&I has efficiently paid out over 99 per cent of all Premium Bonds prizes to our winners since 1957. The quantity of prizes at the moment unclaimed represents simply 0.28 per cent of the full £37bn awarded by Ernie over practically seven a long time.

“We need to reunite individuals with their prizes, so this can be a well timed reminder that even for small holdings which will have been held for a few years, it's value registering your particulars with NS&I.”