Two Bristol-based companies and two company directors have pleaded guilty to 83 offences in relation to prize draw promotions linked to premium rate phone

lines following a massive Trading Standards investigation.

Cutting Edge Telecom Ltd and Pokie Ltd, of 70-72 North Street Bedminster; Joseph Frederick Boll, a director of both companies and Mark Seymour Hunter, a director of Pokie Ltd admitted the offences at Bristol Magistrates Court on Wednesday, December 22nd 2004 following an investigation led by officers from Bristol City Council.

The city council brought the action on their own behalf and on behalf of Durham, Gloucestershire, Shropshire and Hampshire County Councils and Telford and Wrekin District Council following complaints from consumers across the country. It is thought to be the first time that criminal proceedings have been taken against

prize draw scams linked to premium rate telephone lines. The court heard that Bristol's Trading Standards service received a number of complaints during 2003 about the promotions operated by the companies.

Hundreds of thousands of consumers received unsolicited letters from Cutting Edge Telecom Ltd telling them 'You're a WINNER', stating that they had been entered into a competition and that 'You have definitely won one of the following: TVR Cerbera, Sony DVD Player, Toshiba 36" Widescreen TV, Intel Pentium 300 Mhz Personal Computer, Fuji Finepix Zoom Digital Camera, Portable 14" Television'. They were encouraged to call a number to find out which prize they had won and how to claim it. The number was a premium rate number and calls cost £9 each.

Pokie Ltd distributed scratchcards free in newpapers and magazines and the promotion operated in similar way to the Cutting Edge mailshot. The list of prizes was similar and everyone who received a scratchcard was told they were a winner and encouraged to call a premium rate number.

Callers were told that they had won the personal computer. But when they sent off for it they received a leaflet inviting them to contact another company, Key Computers, and asking for £116.33 for a reconditioned computer with a one year warranty - or £180.94 for a computer with an operating system.

Few consumers took up this offer - but many complained they had been misled into making the expensive call by claims in the mailshot that their "prize" was "definitely worth more than the cost of the call" or in the case of the scratchcard "worth at least 40 times the cost of the call" or because they felt it was not a genuine competition and that it was wrong to describe themselves as winners or the computer leaflet as a prize.

At court the defendants pleaded guilty to offences under the Trade Descriptions Act:

· for making false statements that consumers who received the computer leaflet were winners, in that the consumer was not a winner in any recognised sense of the word, and

· for making false statements that consumers had been entered into a competition in that there was no competition, merely the selection of names to whom the mailshot would be sent.

They also pleaded guilty to misleading pricing offences under the Consumer Protection Act:

· for indicating that a computer was one of the prizes and therefore implying that

it would be provided free of charge, when in fact the consumer was required to pay in order to obtain the computer, and · for indicating either that the "prize" was "definitely worth more than the cost of the call" or in the case of the scratchcard "worth at least 40 times the cost of the call".

District Judge David Parsons referred the case to the Crown Court for sentencing, on a date to be confirmed. He told the defendants: “This was a cynical, manipulative and misleading scheme to generate the maximum reward to yourself to the detriment of consumers.”