Win a suit from High and Mighty

Are you on the hunt for a new job or looking to get that tailored feel? Well, enter High and Mighty's  competition to win a bespoke suit, shirt, shoes and tie
There is a second prize of a customised shirt and three further prizes of £50 Amazon vouchers.

You can enter by Liking them on Facebook, following them on Twitter, tweeting about the competition or writing a blog about your dream job and then sending them the link- all of which you do using the Rafflecopter widget on their competition page

They've even provided the Rafflecopter widget so that you can enter directly from here!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The Winner will be announced on the High and Mighty Website at the competition URL: http://www.highandmighty.co.uk/shop/page?pageId=7471

 

Terms and Conditions – The competition is open to UK residents aged 18 and over. Entrants must enter the competition by 31st March 2013 to be entered into the prize draw. Only one entry per person will apply. The prize draw is not open to employees (or members of immediate families) of the JD Williams Group or PushOn integrated. No purchase necessary. The winner will be selected at random and notified by email by 7th April 2013. No cash alternative is available for this prize. The prize must be redeemed in a High and Mighty store only. Late entries will not be accepted. The decision by High and Mighty is final and no correspondence will be entered into. High and Mighty reserve the right to alter, amend or withdraw this prize draw without prior notice should unforeseen circumstances make this unavoidable. Entry into this prize drawn is acceptance of these rules. Entries that do not comply with these rules in full will be disqualified. High and Mighty is a trading division of JD Williams and Company Limited. Registered office: Griffin House, 40 Lever Street, Manchester, M60 6ES. Reg No. 178367.

The latest from Chocolate Log Blog

An emergency biscuit tin - isn't this a great idea?

 

Well, there are two of these to be won over at Chocolate Log Blog  - just head over there and use the Rafflecopter widget to get yourself up to 7 entries, with extra entries for daily tweets. You have until April 2nd to enter.

Win free airport parking for a year!

To celebrate the results of a new frequent flyer survey, in which Manchester airport received high marks from passengers on ease of travel, staff friendliness and arrival procedures, Purple Parking are launching a competition for holidaymakers to win a year’s worth of airport parking (valid at Manchester and Heathrow). To enter passengers are asked to submit a short ‘airport anecdote’: a happy experience they’ve had at the airport, via the company’s website. To find out more and enter visit the Manchester parking page here. Your anecdote can be about any airport, but the prize is valid for Machester and Heathrow.

Competition closes on Monday 1st April 2013. Entries will be judged by Purple Parking and notified via email. Full terms and conditions are on the website.

Award winning Purple Parking, the UK's largest airport car parking operator, has specialised in airport car parking within the Business and Leisure travel market for over 20 years. The company is known for its excellent service and with its consistently competitive prices it is favoured by many customers travelling from the UK.

The things we do for comps!

It is vitally important to check the terms and conditions of a competition  before you enter. Not doing so can lead to the horrible disappointment of being told you have won a prize, only to have it snatched away again when you turn out to have unwittingly broken a rule, for instance being in the wrong age group or not having a required till receipt.

When you are entering a competition online, you can usually simply click on a link to access the rules. But sometimes, promoters make it so difficult for us to read the rules that it makes me wonder whether they feel they have something to hide, or are maybe hoping to have so many incorrect entries  that it is easy to choose a winner.

Competitions advertised on posters and display stands in shops can be the worst culprits. All too often we see a sign just telling us to text a code to a number, without mentioning that a purchase is needed. Last year, for instance, a huge poster in WHSmiths told us to text a code for a chance to win a Mini. So lots of people will have done that without realising they also had to buy a HUGE and quite expensive bar of chocolate.

But for people who subscribe to my magazine Grape Vine, there are no such worries. I go to great lengths to check the terms and conditions and point out any obscure details (find out more about Grape Vine in the links at the top of the page). And sometimes that means going to extraordinary lengths.

Those dump bins in supermarkets that have vague details of a competition splashed across the top and then the terms and conditions written in tiny print at the bottom - or even across the bottom of the back - are the worst culprits. Amazingly enough I've never been questioned by the staff for the attention I give the displays, often rearranging the stock on display or lying on the floor to get a closer look. Sometimes the print is so tiny I have to take my glasses off and press my nose right up against the display to read it. So picture me, lying on the floor of Tesco, nose pressed to the display, one arm holding my glasses high in the air so that nobody wheels a trolley over them, the other frantically scribbling notes, or taking photos on my camera - and nobody bats an eyelid! Maybe the staff in Tesco are used to me by now and expect such behaviour from me. Or perhaps that's just normal behaviour in Aldershot?

Yesterday at the petrol station I did get some odd looks though - dotted around the forecourt were bollards advertising a competition on Lucozade. Once again, the terms and conditions were in tiny print at ground level - and I really didn't want to lie on the oily floor of the forecourt. So I picked up a bollard and placed it on top of my car, where the small print was at eye level. I think the staff thought I was planning to drive away with the bollard perched on top of my car.

So if ever I get arrested for suspicious behaviour, I promise you it was all in the line of duty!

zulily's March Instagram Competition

The theme for this month's zulily Instagram competition is "Cuties Getting Crafty" and the prize is  a £100 zulily voucher to spend on www.zulily.co.uk, a Little Helper Wooden 4-in-1 ArtStation and a Juicy Couture bag for Mum

This month they want to see photos of your little cuties painting, playing with playdough, using wooden blocks or just getting messy. My granddaughter loves sticking stuff together, creating a lovely gluey mess - that's good too! Regular entrants will know the score now but here's a reminder of how to enter.

1. Upload an Instagram snap of your little cutie getting crafty in March
2. Make sure your profile is public, so that they can see your photo.
3. You need to follow zulilyUK on Instagram (@zulilyUK) and tag your picture with three things:

• #zulilyUKMarchCutiesCompetition
• @zulilyUK
• and either: #zulilynewbie (if you’re new to zulily) or #zulilian (if you’ve already joined zulily)

The competition closes on Sunday 31^st of March. Because it’s Easter they’ll be shortlisting on Wednesday 3^rd of April and if you win they'll contact you via Instagram comments - so don't forget to check your comments!

 

The winner will be announced on their blog no later than Friday 5^th April. The Ts&Cs are here. If you haven’t already joined zulily, do come on over!

 

I can't walk on water....

..... neither can  I fly unaided. And I suspect you can't either. (If you CAN walk on water, then Hello, Sir, I'm very honoured that you are reading my blog.)

In fact I'm a flightless bird. As is this.

Which means that if I win a holiday in another country, I expect the prize to include a way to get me there. I can't walk there, I can't fly there, and if I can't get there it isn't much of a prize.

Yet is it quite common to see competitions where flights are not included in the prize. Only this week I saw one where the prize was a  week in a Caribbean resort. I picked a random week and had a look at the value of the prize and  the  possible cost to the winner:

Cost of one week all -inclusive for two people without flights £2,050.00

If the prize had included flights, it would have been worth £3,800 - so you might think to yourself that it's still worth entering because you had budgeted to spend £1,800 on next year's holiday. But hang on, that's the cost of buying the complete package. If you have a no-flights package you have to book the flights yourself and lose any potential saving. Booking scheduled flights for two people to go on that holiday would cost - and this is the cheapest I could find  - £2,800.  The is more than the value of the prize.

Flight-only prizes can work out equally expensive if you buy the very best hotel accommodation, but at least you can use the flights to visit friends or family, or stay somewhere less expensive. And if a prize only includes flights, it is almost always clear from the outset, where as accommodation only prizes often have the fact hidden deep in the terms and conditions, and occasionally not mentioned at all until the winner is contacted.

So before you enter a holiday competition, always check carefully to see what is included, and if an important element is missing, make absolutely you can actually afford to win!

If I cover a holiday competition in the Grape Vine magazine or update, I always check the terms and conditions carefully and tell you if flights are not included, but when you enter other competitions it's up to you to check. And if you are ever told that a holiday prize you have won doesn't include flights, and you are absolutely certain that it wasn't mentioned anywhere in the promotional material or terms, you have an excellent case for complaining to the Advertising Standards Authority and the Institute of Promotional Marketing. Here are some tips on how to do that.

Two great competitons for pet lovers

Pets and House have got two great competitions running for pet lovers.

Their first is for a £20 Amazon voucher. To enter,  visit their Facebook page  and Like it, then the Rafflecopter widget will appear, giving you chances to enter via Facebook and Twitter. This  closes  on March 24th.

The second is for a £10 Amazon voucher. For this, you need to post a photo of your pet at their most relaxed on their Facebook page and will close when the page has 500 Likes.

There's no voting involved (hooray!) - it's going to be properly and fairly judged. The page is run by somebody who is a fellow comper and understands how important that is, so please give it your support!



 

I don't have a pet at the moment so here is a photo of a baby coati to make you say "aaah"