Hi all,

Who's got Premium Bonds then? And how have you fared?

When I STR in April I loaded up to the limit on PBs and have had a disappointing return (£200) in 4 monthly draws, pish poor return.
Of course the money is safe and return of investment is better than return ON investment.

I will leave the money there for another couple of months, then maybe stick half in NS&I Index Linked bonds, got £15K earlier this year.

Come on lady luck!

Frank

Hi, £60,000 in, wife and myself last 7 months winnings £1500.

In a word, crap for us.

Got below IR returns so are getting the last 30k out next month. Got to find a home for this now, bugger.

Have had 30K for 9 months and have so far achieved the same return as if I had put the money into a savings account returning 6.3%

I too have had pretty low returns, but then thats to be expected. Few will actually get average or above average returns on PB's with most getting below average. I'm in that bracket.

Rubbish for me as well, £6K in for 18 months and won 1 x £100 and 1 x £50, around 2% yield

dreadful for me this year, about equiv of 2% gross - having been more like 4% gross in earlier years. I didn't mind losing a couple of percent for the fun of maybe a big win, but have decided that am really not one of life's winners and have pulled out into index-linked savings certificates

Only of use as a plaything to higher rate taxpayers in my opinion.

But that wasn't the question was it! I've had the £100 minimum in since March 2007. Unsurprisingly I've not won a bean. But who knows eh?

Well.... Won £150 this month, whoopee do! My g/f won £100 and she's got 1/30th the number of bonds!

Life is SO unfair

Good luck to all.

Frank

http://www.nsandi.com/products/pb/rates.jsp

The "interest rate" for premium bonds at NS&I is 4% and tax free. I dont put any of my money in premium bonds.

Being a high rate tax payer I thought it would be worth a punt. Running around 4% p.a. at the moment. I just figure that it is worth a punt for a big win as the extra money from a higher rate savings account isn't that much on £30K. A days overtime would make up the shortfall.

Not really worth it unless you are a high rate tax payer and you have used your maximum allowable in an ISA.

Mrs CTT and myself both have the maximum holding, waiting for them to up the maximum. Great Investment for us giving a good return every month. I have a 10k block which returns practically every month.

£2400 since started building up maximum since october 2004

Seemed a good option when the building societys were paying about 3% but not so good when you can walk in the post office and get 6% on a no commitment savings account..

if it were my only savings i would rather get the 6%. But i realise whatever % the building societys paying i would rather have the fun factor of one day picking up an envelope off the mat with a large cheque inside...

Like you hb I have 2K in P.B's since Oct 2006, was about to give them up when the brown envelope dropped through my letter box. Then two months later
another envelope for 50 quid came. So this equals about 5% tax free not bad. I have a theory that they allow you a couple of wins to keep you happy, then nothing ever again, as my partner put in 4k of P.B's three years ago. She had two wins of £50 in the same year, then nothing since.

If it`s the million you will have a chap called Andrew knocking on your door together with his assistant.

I had 30K worth for 6 months and didn't win a thing. I dropped to 10K and suddenly won 8 months in a row (£50 per time). Sold them all after the 8th winning month to invest in other stuff.

Mr.Mangle

check out moneysavingexpert.com, they have a calculator on there where it works the probability out for you. looks like a con to me !

I doubt if many people reading MSE pay the higher rate tax.

£30k invested. Results are:

Sep £100.00
Sep £50.00
Aug £50.00
Aug £50.00
Aug £50.00
Jun £50.00
May £50.00
May £50.00
Mar £500.00
Mar £50.00
Mar £50.00
Feb £50.00
Jan £100.00
Jan £100.00
Jan £50.00
Dec £50.00
Dec £50.00
Total £1,450.00

Equivalent Rate of Interest To Date(%) 4.83.

I keep them as I like the few seconds before I check the monthly draw to see if I have a big, big win.

I've had £1200 in premium bonds for about 6 years.
Never had a penny.

My neighbour bought £100 and has had £50. The b@stard!

EDIT: Profanity filter.

Similar story here (although not such as high an initial investment). Bought 10k in Jan 2007 and won just £150 over the course of six draws (March-August) ... halved holding after August 2007 draw and won the same amount in just the next three draws (Sept-Nov)! Perhaps it's their subtle way of asking you to put your money back in? Still would have been better off putting the whole lot in a higher interest savings account overall though!

we have £60k and have won small amounts, maybe if you all jumped out of PB we would stand a better chance of winning

In the new year we plan to move this money to high interest savers off shore account or gold, however still looking into it at the moment.

Typically much lower returns than a savings account on maximum allowed rarely a win for me when I had them.

However some do win almost every month.

I may put £5K in but wouldn't bother with more than that and even that runs the risk of £250 lost interest a year if you win nothing (quite likely to win just £50 to £100 or even nothing in a year).

My son was bought £100 worth for Christmas last year. He has won £150.

I was bought the minimum £2 about 40 years ago and have never won.

After getting no win this Month . i have decided to work out wether they are worth keeping . Heres how mine fared this year. (30K)
JAN=£0 RRRRRRRRRRRR no win im getting rid of the stupid ripoff things.
FEB=£150 YIPEEEEEEEEEEEE Sorry Mr Premiumbond i forgive ya.
March £100 MMM Premium Bonds are great everyone should get them.
MARCH=£0 !"£$%^&*(_)(*&^%$£""£$%^& Things getting rid off them.
MAY= £0 I dont believe it in my biggest and baddest Victor Meldrew voice.
JUN=£150 Happy HAPPY days.
JUL=£1050 BACKFLIP. Novelty wore off after a couple of minutes only fun i had with the cheque was showing everyone else.
AUG=£0 wheres my win...ok i let ya off had a big one last month..........
SEPT=£0 )(*&^%$£"wheres me "£$%^&* winnings.
OCT=£100 Thankyou Mr PB
NOV=£100 2x £50 cheques misers..
DEC=£0 . Dissilusioned Time to get a pen and paper out and work out wether these are worth keeping

So as long as me maffs is good.. 30k at 6%=£1800 -22% TAX=£1404 versus PREMIUM SCUM sorry i got nowt this month and still cheesed........P.B Just about scrapes through with £1650.
Without that £1000 win they would have been cashed in this morning first thing.

I know they say it makes no difference but would you rather have your holding in consequtive numbers?

Your best chance, a £10k block.

Had a 30000 block for 12 months

Total winnings to date = £1150

Net annual % return = 1150/30000 = 3.833%

To calculate net annual % return you need to know average annual winnings, which is (winnings/months held) * 12. In my example this wasn't necessary because I've held mine for exactly a year

However, it's better than this because no tax paid is paid on this so the equivalent savings account rate before tax @ 40% = 3.8333/(1-40/100) = 6.39%

The last bit of this calculation shows how much of an effect the tax-free status of the winnings can have. Don't forget to do this bit when working out returns!

Charlie, if you buy £10,000 of premium bonds and check the serial numbers you'll see they almost always sell them in consecutive blocks anyway, ie 2 lots of 5000 bonds but consecutively numbered, effectively a 10K block in all but name.

In my experience that has not made any positive difference.

I had bonds myself - very poor wins.

Someone I know has them - ditto.

All consecutive blocks - me was 4 lots of consecutive 5K blocks, she with 6 (max holding) consecutive 5K blocks.

No difference. Still a poor rate of wins.

If your luck's out it's out.

But well done Charlie, I hope your winning streak continues.

Hi, Have 25 pounds worth for 20 years - nothing.
A friend had 1 premium bond (his aunt bought it for him years ago) he won a grand!

Hi Frank, I'm new here. I've had max PBs for 2 years now and am pleased with the results. I rarely miss a month and generally have several wins, though no biggies. Here's my results for past 6 months.
28KE553376 50 February
28KE554200 50 February
76QN701073 50 February
76QN702443 50 February
76QN703129 50 February
68BG731780 500 December
76QN700074 50 December
76QN702704 50 December
48PT619703 500 November
41CW815954 100 October
41CW814954 50 October
28KE551278 50 October
103XE438929 50 September
28KE553388 500 August
41CW814897 100 Augus

Hi spiderling welcome to forum from a fellow Devonian (Exeter). When I sold to divorce in 2006, I thought about putting a large chunk on my fund into P.B's, but bottled out at the last minute, and bought 5K's worth instead and scattered the rest among high interest savings accounts. You say you have had P.B's for two years, was this at the max? And if so have you had the same winning pattern every six months?

Hi Sparkie and thanks for welcome. No, getting to £30k was a long and arduous road. I got £2000 many decades ago; I won £50. the 1st draw, but a friend was in trouble so I gave it to her. Ditto the next month, with a different person. I then decided to reinvest automatically and kept winning small and regular sums, and adding when I did some work. 10 years or so later my dad died, he wasn't a property owner but I then added £10k to at last get the then max. Went on winning nice encouraging little amounts. Then this gov upped it to £30k, to my despair. My husband was then about to retire so, as he saw I was doing fairly well, he gave me £10k to bring it to max. As you see, it's paid off. All I was really hoping for was additional income, which is exactly what it's done. Sorry for boring life story, if it reads like that. Good luck for tomorrow's draw. Have you got a website I can look at? There such interesting glimpses into people's lives and secret thoughts.

I've had 30K for about 4 years now. First couple of years returns were great then went downhil.. Am considering taking it all out and putting it back in.

I'm sure I'd do that, Tulip, if it happened to me, though it hasn't yet. How "great" was great. I've mostly had £50s and £100s, though 3 £500s lately. Never anything larger. I mean, you need win £1million only once. Good luck for March.

Never had a £500 - only £100 2 or 3 times. Usually 1 £50 per month, sometimes 2, occasionally 3. Sometimes nothing. I kept a diary on uk.finance for a while recording the sums but gave up in the end. If you do some research on google there is a lot of anecdotal evidence that more recent bonds win greater prizes.

About 2 or 3 years ago 2 or 3 millionaires in one year only had bought their bonds that year which, by chance, was the same year the Govt was doing a lot of advertising for bonds PLUS the computerised draw system had just been redesigned by a big IT company. I think one of the million winner had only bought their bonds the previous month or two - no more.

They say that there are more current bonds in circulation and that's why they appear to win more often.

Assuming you're not teasing us, you've been very fortunate indeed.

Most would be lucky to win £50 a month on the max holding, let along several £500s a year.

I would say the average return on £30K invested is £200 to £1000 a year, pretty poor, unless luck/chance sides with you.

Bear, I wasn't "teasing". I copied/pasted my results from the NSI site. March, I know I'm not a high winner (never have been) and low prizes don't seem to be online yet. I'll post here when I know either way. Good luck all.

I can assure you the vast majority, the vast vast majority would be lucky to see even one £500 prize on a max holding even once a year or once in 2 or 3 or more years, so you are a high winner of sorts as you've well beaten the odds. Someone Up There obviously favours you or your drip feeding technique has somehow worked (it's not supposed to make any difference if bonds are gathered from different serial number batches, is it?!)

Anyway, I hope your good run goes on, nice to hear someone's winning! (Certainly never was me!)

Bear, I'm sure I posted my March result - 2 X £50. - but can't find it here.

I am convinced that newer bonds are winning at the expense of older ones. I have no hard scientific proof for that other than I often read posts on the net from new maximum bond holders who are delighted with their winnings. I wonder if the change of computer system a few years back affected this?

Tulip, someone told me that the way the program was originally written favoured new bonds. I haven't a clue about this and the person who told me knows zilch about programming. Someone must have told him. Whether that person knew anything I don't know.

I'm L Bear not Bear, as there are lots of Bears! Anyway sounds a bit like calling someone by their surname in the army or a public school!



Nope, when my bonds were new and large chunks they didn't win either!

[quote name='The Last Bear' date='Mar 4 2008, 02:49 PM' post='998283']
I'm L Bear not Bear, as there are lots of Bears! Anyway sounds a bit like calling someone by their surname in the army or a public school!



The Last Bear, sorry for wrong name.

The Last Bear, sorry for wrong name.
[/quote]

No probs, I never insist people call me Sir Last Bear these days, except at offical Garden Parties and investitures!

By the way, well done on the £100 this month, you're well ahead of most, looks like ERNIE has a bit of a crush on you!

Another month, another draw and still no win for me.
I'm giving them until Xmas and if I've had nothing by then I'm cashing them in and sticking the £1200 (I've had for 5 years with no wins) in Icesave.