The first Premium Bonds millionaires of 2021 come from West Scotland and Barnet.
330VT557685 was the first Bonds number drawn and belongs to a woman from West Scotland. Her winning Bond was purchased in May 2018 and is part of a £50,000 holding. The Premium Bonds jackpot win makes the woman the second winner from West Scotland.
2021’s second Premium Bonds millionaire is a woman from Barnet. Her Bond number 135RY390643 is part of a £20,000 holding and was purchased in January 2008. The win makes the woman the third winner from Barnet.
The way Premium Bonds prizes are paid is changing from Spring 2021
From Spring 2021, NS&I will begin to phase out the use of Premium Bonds prize cheques. Instead, Premium Bonds customers can arrange to have any prizes they win paid directly into their bank account or automatically reinvested into more Premium Bonds up to the maximum limit of £50,000. The withdrawal of prize warrants will not begin until the spring of 2021 so customers do not need to take action now and can do so at a later date.
There are several ways that Premium Bonds customers can provide NS&I with their bank account details:
- Customers already registered for NS&I’s online and phone services can input their bank account details quickly, easily and securely by logging into their account on NS&I’s website. They should visit nsandi.com and use the secure log in. They should go to ’Your profile’ and select ‘Your prize options’ and choose to have prizes paid directly to their bank account or to have prizes automatically reinvested into more Premium Bonds.
- Customers who are not registered can use NS&I’s new prize options service. The new service consists of a secure three-stage process. Customers can visit www.nsandi.com/prize-options to input their bank account details and should have their Premium Bonds holder’s number to hand, which they can find on their Bond record. Customers should enter their UK bank account details and can choose to have prizes paid directly into their bank account or reinvested into more Premium Bonds (up to the maximum £50,000). Customers who opt to use this service will need either an email address or a mobile phone number so that NS&I can notify them of any prize win by either text message or email.
- Customers who are unable to provide their bank details online can phone our call centre on 08085 007 007 to select their prize options.
Checking Premium Bonds prizes
Customers can check to see if they have won on the nsandi.com prize checker, prize checker app or via their Alexa enabled device from Tuesday 5 January 2021. Customers will need their Premium Bonds holder’s number to use the website and their NS&I number or holder’s number to check via the app.
Premium Bonds in 2020
2020 saw 24 Premium Bonds customers made millionaires, while more than 43 million prizes worth over £1.2 billion were paid out across the year. There were 14 female winners in 2020 and 10 male winners, whilst the Premium Bonds holders in the East won the jackpot most frequently in 2020, with five jackpot winners coming from the region.
July’s winner from Tyne and Wear held his winning Bond for just 61 days before winning the jackpot, whilst September’s winner from South Scotland held her winning Bond for 6,394 days before winning the top prize, which was the longest of all of the jackpot winners in 2020.
The average holding of 2020’s £1 million jackpot winners was £35,713, while the lowest holding value to win the big prize was £4,014 in February 2020. In March 2020, a man from Cambridgeshire saw a Bond number as part of a reinvested £25 prize from 20 months previous scoop the jackpot.
January 2021 prize draw breakdown
In the January 2021 prize draw, a total of 2,921,327 prizes worth £83,988,150 will be paid out. There were 100,785,783,846 Bond numbers eligible for the draw. Since the first draw in June 1957, ERNIE has drawn 510 million prizes with a total value of £21.4 billion.
Value of prize | Number of prizes |
£1,000,000 | 2 |
£100,000 | 4 |
£50,000 | 10 |
£25,000 | 17 |
£10,000 | 43 |
£5,000 | 89 |
£1,000 | 1,679 |
£500 | 5,037 |
£100 | 27,295 |
£50 | 27,295 |
£25 | 2,859,856 |
Total £83,988,150 |
Total 2,921,327 |