New millionaire from Suffolk in NS&I September draw

The lady from Suffolk asked to remain anonymous, though said of her win: "This is an exciting win for me and my family, though I have to admit I'm still in a state of shock! To win the top prize only five months after buying my Bonds is so unexpected, but proof that you have to be in it to win it - you never know when your lucky number might be chosen." This is the fourth time that the £1 million jackpot has been won by a person living in Suffolk, the last time was in November 2000.

In Suffolk, over 300,000 people hold Premium Bonds worth over £629 million. There are just over 4,500 unclaimed Premium Bond prizes in total worth over £268,000.

In March, NS&I announced that from the April prize draw onwards, one of the two monthly £1 million Premium Bond jackpot prizes would be replaced by a wider mix of other prizes in the monthly draws.

Similarly, a new £25 Premium Bonds prize has been introduced to the draws alongside the existing prizes (ranging from £50 to £1 million). These changes have been introduced because Premium Bond holders say that maintaining the chances of winning tax-free prizes on a regular basis is particularly important to them.

In September's draw ERNIE paid out over 1.1 million prizes, together amounting to more than £33 million in value. There were 40,560,433,094 eligible Bond numbers in the draw.

Premium Bond facts

The current Premium Bonds prize fund rate is 1.0% tax-free. The current odds of each £1 Bond number winning any prize are 36,000 to 1, so with average luck, an investor with £30,000 in Premium Bonds could win 10 tax-free prizes a year. At the end of July 2009, over 23 million people had a total of over £40 billion invested in Premium Bonds.

Premium Bonds can be bought online at nsandi.com.

Like all NS&I products, Premium Bonds offer investors 100% capital security, backed by HM Treasury, as well as the sense of fun that comes from potentially winning tax-free prizes.

Since the first Premium Bonds prize draw in 1957, over 193 million tax-free prizes worth over £12 billion have been paid out. Prizes range from £25 to £1 million.

There are currently almost 600,000 unclaimed Premium Bond prizes, worth over £35 million. There is no time limit for claiming prizes. Premium Bonds investors can check to see if they have won by visiting nsandi.com and using the Premium Bonds prize checker.