You can choose to have your prizes paid directly to your bank account (or NS&I Direct Saver) or reinvested into more Bonds, giving you even more chances to win. Choose either of these options and we'll let you know by text or email if you win. It's the quicker, easier, safer and greener way to receive your prizes.
Winners are notified by text and/or email, or if you win the £1,000,000 prize a person named Agent Million will visit you personally to give you the good news. There's also no time limit for claiming your premium bond prize.
You can even say your NS&I number to a device that has Amazon's Alexa service, to see if your luck is in. NS&I contacts all winners to let them know if they have won a prize - if you have registered online then you will be sent an email. Alternatively, you may be notified by a letter in the post.
Having your prizes paid straight into your bank account (or NS&I Direct Saver) is quick, easy and safe. If you win, we'll let you know the good news by email or text message. You'll then normally receive your prize money in your bank account by the 7th working day of the month.
We pay out two £1 million jackpots each month.
One in a million
Our Agents Million have the important task of delivering the winning news in person to the two monthly jackpot winners. Since the first Premium Bonds millionaire in 1994, over 400 new millionaires have been paid a visit.
Other requirements are that the investment is greater than the minimum limit and in whole pounds, and uses a UK bank account which is in the purchaser's name. NS&I states that if a transfer takes a person over the £50,000 limit, then the transfer will be automatically refunded in full to the bank account.
How long does it take to cash in Premium Bonds? According to NS&I, it takes up to three banking days for the money to reach your account, unless you have elected to cash in after the next draw.
Each month a draw is made and around £100m is won by Premium Bond holders. The top prize is a £1m jackpot. Tax and you do not need to declare it on your tax return. Anybody over the age of 16 can buy Premium Bonds, and you can also buy them on behalf of your child or grandchild.
The maximum premium bonds are currently £50,000 per person. So you and your partner can hold £50,000 each. Then any children can hold the same in premium bonds too.
If you want instant access to your cash, have £50,000 to invest, and especially if you pay higher rates of tax they are good value, returning on average around 2pc a year tax-free. But it is a close-run thing as market rates from banks and building societies are rising rapidly. Premium Bonds work like this.
For those who have not chosen to receive prize payments straight into their bank accounts, NS&I prize cheques are valid for three months – however some banks will accept them for up to six months.
Dealing with Premium Bonds after someone's death
Assets are generally sold or encashed during the administration period, although some can be transferred to beneficiaries who wish to keep the holding.
Your Premium Bonds are grouped under a single holder's number. This number has 10 or 9 digits, or 8 digits followed by a letter. You can find your holder's number by logging in to our online service and checking your Premium Bonds account page. Or you can call us for a replacement Bond record and we'll sent it to you.
Each £1 placed into Premium Bonds has an equal chance of getting a prize, so the more savings you have, the more chance you have of winning. Martin emphasised that Premium Bonds won't pay out much more on average than the interest on easy access or fixed rate savings accounts.
In general, you need to hold the bonds for a full month before they're eligible to win. So buy bonds any time in June and they'll be in the draw from August.
Our Premium Bonds give you the chance to win cash prizes from £25 up to £1 million in our monthly prize draw. If you're a lucky winner, you won't have to pay a penny in tax on your prize. If you already hold some of our Savings Certificates, you won't have to pay tax on any returns you earn.
No income tax or Capital Gains Tax is payable on the prizes won on Premium Bonds, however the value of the Premium Bonds owned will be included in a deceased person's Estate for Inheritance Tax purposes.
However, if you acquired a tax-exempt bond at a premium, only report the net amount of tax-exempt interest on line 2a of your Form 1040 or 1040-SR (that is, the excess of the tax-exempt interest received during the year over the amortized bond premium for the year).
If you want a regular income, Premium Bonds may not be the best option for you - you may be better off looking at different types of investment or savings accounts, including isas. You'll also receive no interest, as the interest accrued on bonds goes towards the prize fund.
Call 08085 007 007 (or +44 1253 832007 if you're outside the UK) for help if you're struggling to find info on your bond. Your bonds never expire and they're tied to the purchaser's name for life, so even if you lose the bond you're still entitled to the funds.
Meanwhile, there will be 223 £25,000 prizes – up from 71 this month – while the number of £10,000 prizes will go up from 178 to 559, and the number of £5,000 prizes from 359 to 1,118. However, the number of £1m prizes is not changing – it is being kept at two a month.
A There are all sorts of theories. However there is absolutely no evidence that holding premium bonds in a single block has a better chance of winning.
Premium Bonds holders can check to see if they have won a prize in August's prize draw, by using the nsandi.com prize checker, official prize checker app or their Alexa-enabled device from Tuesday 2 August 2022.
Some of the disadvantages of bonds include interest rate fluctuations, market volatility, lower returns, and change in the issuer's financial stability. The price of bonds is inversely proportional to the interest rate. If bond prices increase, interest rates decrease and vice-versa.