The You Say, We Pay game is a version of charades where the
viewer describes a picture for married hosts Judy Finnegan and
Richard Madeley who have to guess the picture from the viewer's
description.
A £1 phone line is the method of entry to the quiz, and viewers
are encouraged throughout the show to enter. Weekend press reports
revealed, though, that a shortlist of 24 entrants was sent by the
phone competition company to the television show's producers at
5.09pm from which the contestant would be picked.
Despite the fact that subsequent callers could not have got on
to that shortlist for a chance to play and win the quiz, another
call for entries was made on air at 5.19pm. Emails leaked to the
press show that in one week 32,000 people who had no chance of
becoming that day's contestant phoned into the show.
The competition did not run last Friday and the competition is
now being investigated by the premium rate phone number regulator
ICSTIS (Independent Committee for the Supervision of Standards of
the Telephone Information Services).
"The allegations, published in The Mail On Sunday on 18
February 2007, claim that potential winners are randomly selected
from callers who ring within the first five to seven minutes of the
show," said an ICSTIS statement. "Despite this, viewers are not
told to stop calling and are, in fact, actively encouraged to keep
on dialling the premium rate number."
"ICSTIS is currently in the process of gathering evidence from
Eckoh Technologies (UK) Ltd (the premium rate service provider
regulated by ICSTIS), Cactus TV (the production company) and
Channel 4 to assist its investigation. It has also asked The
Mail On Sunday for its evidence. ICSTIS’ investigation centres
on paragraph 5.4.1 of its Code of Practice, which states that
services and promotional material must not "mislead, or be likely
to mislead in any way".
"We take these claims seriously and will be investigating them
fully," said a Channel 4 statement. "Channel 4 is committed to
ensuring all our on-air competitions are conducted fairly and
transparently and we reject any suggestion that we would knowingly
mislead viewers in any way."
"Channel 4 engages a specialist service provider to operate the
phone lines, administer the competition and put forward the names
of potential winners to the production company, Cactus TV," it
said. "Our contract with the service provider clearly states they
must comply fully with the codes that govern competitions of this
nature, drawn up by ICSTIS."
ICSTIS recently conducted a review of premium rate competitions
on television and said that they should warn callers each time they
spend £10 or more and also tell them how small the chances were
that they would end up on air.
See: ICSTIS Code
of Practice (43-page / 491KB PDF)
See also: TV quizzes should warn on cost
and odds, says regulator, OUT-LAW News, 30/01/2007
