The Halifax, a subsidiary of the 43% UK Government owned Lloyd's Banking Group has announced a savers lottery - with 3 guaranteed winners of £100,000 every month.
I thought the UK Health Lottery was tacky until I saw this...
Because we think saving should be rewarded with more than interest, every month we're giving three savers £100,000 in our new Halifax Savers Prize Draw.
And, over a thousand other customers will win smaller prizes. All you have to do is hold £5,000 in qualifying savings accounts each calendar month and register.
As a marketing ploy, I am sure someone at the Halifax had a wonderfully plausible steaming great pile of MBA style bullshit showing why this was a good idea. I imagine it included market segmentation showing how many savers would move funds to Halifax given the possibility of a £100,000 lottery win if only they save just £5,000. I am sure the research suggested people would happily confuse headlines about gambling bankers with the chance to gamble with their banking too.
Now, as far as I am concerned, Halifax is quite at liberty to waste money however its shareholders let it but there will be others who will wail and gnash their teeth in all sorts of colourful ways. Some will scream about taxpayers money being wasted on providing lottery wins to the already well-enough-off (to have £5,000 in savings) and others will talk sonorously about the small business loans that are foregone by this action.
Whatever...
I am just mildly surprised, when the very future of banking is being debated, including at the heart of the debate, how the risks of banking should be shared between customers, bankers, shareholders and taxpayers (to name most of those vying for the chance to fund banking losses), I can't help thinking that setting up a savings lottery is not the cleverest idea...
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