The staggering amount ITV makes from competitions and the odds of winning | Television and Radio | Show business and TV

ITV is known for hosting a number of competitions as part of some of its most popular shows. Breakfast shows such as This Morning, Good Morning Britain and Loose Women offer the chance to win cash, a fancy new car or a holiday.

Host Andy Peters often offers the biggest cash prizes. Often one lucky winner is awarded an amount in excess of £250,000.

The broadcasters are currently running a Countdown to Christmas competition where viewers can win £54,321. Another competition, which is part of the Winsday draw, gives people the chance to accumulate £15,000 to spend with TUI.

Fans of the show can enter in three ways – by mail, online or SMS – and all methods should give you the same chance of winning. While postal entries are free, online and SMS entries cost £2 each. Sometimes they also offer packages where you get more recordings at a slightly reduced price.

To make competitions profitable for ITV, they must be expensive to enter, but they also appear to be a key source of income. For example, a £100,000 competition would only need 50,000 spectators to break even.

How much does ITV make from the competition?

While the broadcaster is reluctant to disclose entry numbers, it is estimated that millions of people take part in the prize draw each year due to the income generated.

Television competitions are an important source of income for public broadcasters. In 2019, ITV was reported to have made a whopping £84 million from entry.

What are the chances of winning the ITV competition?

Unfortunately, ITV doesn’t release much information about the number of entrants, so it’s difficult to know exactly what the chances of winning are. However, broadcasters publish the list of winners whenever they are announced and this can be seen. Here.

Are ITV competitions a scam?

There have been controversies around ITV competitions before. ITV contacted Ofcom after it discovered that some postal entries were not included in the selection process for six competitions between 2014 and 2019.

ITV did not specify which competitions were affected and blamed “unintentional administrative errors”. They released a statement at the time saying: “The integrity of all ITV-run viewing competitions is an absolute priority for us, so any error involved is taken very seriously.

“However, it is important to note the scale and nature of this particular problem, which has only affected a very small number of our spectator competitions over a number of years. These six competitions represent approximately one-third of one percent of our competitions since 2014 and represent only a small portion of the total number of entries.”

ITV said the error prevented any entrant from winning a prize and the editorial content of any programs was not affected.

The broadcasters posted a statement on their FAQ page that contestants will receive confirmation of their entries to ensure they are considered. It says: “When you log in online, you will see a message confirming that your entry has been received.

“You will also receive an email from PayPal confirming payment for your application, or a text message if you log in via Payforit. Every successful entry, by any means, whether free or paid, has an equal chance of winning.”

What rules are there for ITV competitions?

ITV competitions are generally open to residents of the UK, Channel Islands and Isle of Man aged 18 or over. It is generally accepted practice to exclude from participation all employees of the Promotion, their immediate families and anyone professionally associated with the competition.