Two million Premium Bond prizes left unclaimed

More than 2m Premium Bond prizes worth nearly £ 80m have not been claimed by lucky savers, figures show.

They are missing out on five £ 100,000 payouts and nine worth £50,000, according to figures from National Savings & Investments.

Some 2.27m payouts have not been collected within 18 months of being won, according to the data obtained by website Moneysavingexpert. This is 189,630 since last year.

The payouts include 11 prizes worth £25,000, 37 prizes of £10,000 and 69 worth £ 5,000. More than half of the unclaimed prizes – 1.7m – were worth £25.

In London there are 414,748 savers affected – the highest of any region. The South East, North West and East Anglia were other hotspots. Some of the prizes were won decades ago.

Chris Newlands of MSE said: “For those who suspect they might have let their Premium Bonds fall by the wayside, these figures should be a wake- up call. Some of the pots available could be potentially life- changing for people – especially right now.” A quarter of a million prizes were waiting to be claimed by people living overseas or whose locations were unknown by NS&I.

There is no time limit on claims so savers can still get their hands on winnings. Children of account holders who have died can fill in a form to tell NS&I about the death and claim the prizes.

The institution also offers a tracing service to help people find out if a deceased relative had ever opened an NS&I account or won a prize.

To avoid missing out on winnings, savers who win a prize of up to £1,000 can be notified by email or text message. They can also have the prizes paid directly into their bank account or have it reinvested into Premium Bonds. Savers with prizes higher than this are notified by post.

NS& I said its letters to winners could sometimes get lost in the post and customers did not always update their contact details.

The Treasury-backed savings institution said it contacted every winner using the option they had selected: text, email or post.