'Digest' drops prize draws

Reader's Digest is to stop organising prize draws in the United States. The move could herald the end of the familiar mailshots promising large sums of money in the UK.

An American spokesman for the general-interest magazinesaid the company was paying less attention to bulk mailing. The decision follows controversy about the use of prize draws. In 2001, the Reader's Digest Association reached a settlement with 32 US states, agreeing to pay $8m (£5m) to remedy what prosecutors said were deceptive marketing practices.

In Britain, cash prizes of up to £250,000 have been given away for 30 years. There has been a move to other forms of marketing in recent years. But the London headquarters of Reader's Digest insisted yesterday that prize draws in the UK were "alive and kicking".