Premium Bonds and the Unluckiest Man in Great Britain
There have been many success stories about premium bonds, but there are also some pretty amazing failure stories. Premium bonds, the British way to save money for no interest and a chance to win cash prizes have made many people millionaires and have given cash prizes that will exceed the interest that is given in banks or other bond programs. The odds are better than the American lottery and you can cash in your bonds at any time for the exact amount you purchased them for. For as many successes there are failures that are sometimes considered the worst luck in premium bond history.
A gentleman bought one hundred pounds worth of premium bonds in 1967. That was a lot of money to invest back then and the hope of becoming a million pound winner lingered with the man until this day. He has not won one single cash prize since he purchased the bonds and that luck still runs with him today. The average amount of winnings for the average investor is about three to four percent of the investment put in. This man has not made a single pound, but he refuses to cash in his bonds and look for another type of investment.
He does have some animosity toward the program that he expresses in a civil manner. He states that every time he sees an advertisement for premium bonds on the television he wants to smash the set in anger. Stating that one hundred pounds was then his monthly salary, he feels the National Savings and Investment agency has let him down. He does refuse to quit completely and will not cash in, but he screams he will not put another pound into the system until he sees a return on his investment. He has since invested into regular savings bonds where he is earning a meager interest.
He has made several pleas to the National Savings and Investments agency for an explanation of why he hasn’t won, but he has received no answers to his questions in the replies because there are no answers why one wins and another does not and that infuriates him further. The National Savings and Investments post their statistics on earnings on a monthly basis but this gentleman refuses to listen to the math. He just wants an apology and information how he could not have won in almost seventy years. The man believes that the agency is responsible for his bad luck and wishes he never became part of the program.
His further irritation is that he would have made an eight hundred percent profit on those hundred pounds if he had invested in a building society fund. It’s worth noting there were many other investments where he could have lost all his money unlike Premium Bonds where his investment fund is always safe and there to be withdrawn in full whenever he likes. There is a possibility that the man had been slighted in the early days of the premium bond because the bond numbers had to be matched by real people and not a computer and the human element could have skipped over his numbers. The man stated that he just wanted to win once so that his title of the unluckiest man in Great Britain would go away.
