Gardener wins case against Paddy Power over £1m prize

11 hours ago

Tess de la Mare

BBC News, Gloucestershire

Corrine Durber, with her husband Colin (left) and her solicitor Peter Coyle (right) outside the High Court

PA Media A woman stands in the middle of two men. She is wearing a dark jacket and white tee-shirt, one of the men wears a blue suit, the other is wearing a dark jumper. They are pouring a bottle of champagne. They are standing in front of an ornate, carved stone arch. — Corrine Durber, with her husband Colin (left) and her solicitor Peter Coyle (right) outside the High Court

A gardener who was told by Paddy Power her £1m jackpot from an online game was a computer error has vowed to "enjoy retirement" after a High Court judge ruled she was entitled to the entire sum.

Corrine Durber, from Gloucestershire, played the Wild Hatter game in October 2020 - a two-part game involving a fruit machine and a wheel of fortune.

After spinning the jackpot wheel, Mrs Durber's iPad Screen displayed she had won the "Monster Jackpot", which was stated as £1,097,132.71.

But the gambling giant only paid out £20,265 telling her she had won the smaller "Daily Jackpot", with the difference attributed to a programming error with the game's display.

Mrs Durber sued PPB Entertainment Limited, which trades as Paddy Power and Betfair, for breach of contract and for the rest of her winnings, based on what she was shown on screen.

In a judgment on Wednesday, Mr Justice Ritchie granted summary judgment in her favour, meaning she won her case without a trial.

He said: "When a trader puts all the risk on a consumer for its own recklessness, negligence, errors, inadequate digital services and inadequate testing, that appears onerous to me."

Speaking to ITV news, Mrs Durber said the money would be lifechanging for her family.

"Obviously it will look after the children, from that we'll pay their mortgages and we're going to enjoy our retirement," she said.

Corrine Durber said she would never bet with Paddy Power again

PA Media A woman stands outside an ornate carved stone building. She has short grey hair and is wearing a dark green linen jacket and white tee-shirt. — Corrine Durber said she would never bet with Paddy Power again

PPB had said that the outcome was determined by a random number generator, which had said she had only won the daily jackpot, but an error affected the animations of the game and showed her the wrong result.

Mr Justice Ritchie said that the idea of "what you see is what you get" was central to the game.

He continued in a 62-page ruling: "Objectively, customers would want and expect that what was to be shown to them on screen to be accurate and correct.

"The same expectation probably applies when customers go into a physical casino and play roulette.

"They expect the house to pay out on the roulette wheel if they bet on number 13 and the ball lands on number 13."

The judge found that the result from the random number generator was different from the result on screen due to human error in mapping the software, which had affected 14 plays over 48 days.

'Relieved and happy'

Mrs Durber said she was "relieved and happy" that the judge had confirmed she won "fairly and squarely" £1m from Paddy Power.

She added: "But why couldn't Paddy Power pay-up straight away instead of putting me through this legal torment?"

Following the ruling, a spokesperson for Paddy Power, said: "We always strive to provide the best customer experience possible and pride ourselves on fairness.

"We deeply regret this unfortunate case and are reviewing the judgment."