GMTV fined £2 million over phone-in scandal

Updated 20.41 Wed Sep 26 2007

Keywords: GMTV

Breakfast television broadcaster GMTV has been fined £2 million for its part in the phone-in competitions scandal.

The fine is the largest penalty imposed against a broadcaster by watchdog Ofcom which has also ordered GMTV to broadcast a summary of its findings.

The competition picked finalists before phone lines had closed, meaning substantial numbers of people who entered had no chance of winning

The competition picked finalists before phone lines had closed, meaning substantial numbers of people who entered had no chance of winning.

The misconduct fine comes after GMTV's competition phone line provider, Opera Telecom Ltd, was told to pay £250,000 by premium rate phone line regulator Icstis.

Picking potential winners early came at a cost of some £20 million to callers.

At least 18 million viewers were charged for entering the GMTV phone-in competition with no chance of winning over a period of nearly four years, spending on average more than £1 on each call.

GMTV, which has suspended its premium rate competitions, was found to be in breach of the Broadcasting Code on the fair conduct of competitions.GMTV issued a statement saying it accepted full responsibility for the scandal.

It said: "GMTV accepts Ofcom's judgment and, as broadcaster, takes full responsibility for the breaches of the Ofcom Broadcasting Code.

"As soon as we became aware of the problems, we took all premium rate services off air and in July launched a series of comprehensive remedies to recompense our viewers.

"We are offering refunds to disenfranchised entrants and to date nearly 130,000 viewers have contacted our refund helpline, which is still open online, and will remain open, for the foreseeable future.

"GMTV has announced a new code for premium rate competitions and we will not reintroduce them into our programmes until we are absolutely sure that the right compliance procedures are in place to enable our viewers to continue to enjoy the competitions knowing they are run fairly and honestly."

The broadcaster said it had also made a £250,000 donation to ChildLine.