Kent Couple Given Fright Before Big Lotto Win is Confirmed

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A couple from Kent have decided to bring their wedding date forward by a year and splash out on their dream house after becoming Lotto millionaires. They landed their prize on Saturday 29th September, but were given quite a scare before their claim was confirmed.

Air conditioning engineer Mick Tyler, 35, received an email from the National Lottery on the night of the draw informing him that he had won £1 million. Fiancée Sarah Harmer, a 33-year-old legal team assistant, quickly checked the results and found out that they had matched the winning Lotto Millionaire Raffle code.

They had to call the National Lottery to claim the win, but as the contact centre helpline did not open until the following morning they had an anxious wait. When they were able to call, it seemed for a moment as if they had built their hopes up for nothing.

‘Screaming and Shouting’

Mick recalled: “We set our alarms and at 8am we were straight on the phone. We rang, we spoke to them. I spoke to someone from the hotline and he then said ‘yeah, you’re 29th October’. He said ‘oh no, no you haven’t won’. I looked at Sarah and I was like ‘oh’. And then he said ‘oh sorry, it’s my mistake, I was looking at the wrong date’ and he said ‘yeah I can confirm you’ve won £1 million’.”

Speaking at a media ceremony at Reculver Visitor Centre to share their story, Mick and Sarah revealed that they started ‘screaming and shouting’ straight after the phone call and then rang their families to spread the news. They skipped a day off work and took their families out for a nice lunch and a few drinks.

They jetted off for a pre-booked holiday to Portugal the next day and have already been busy making plans for the future. Having initially set a date in 2020 to get married - so they would have enough time to save money - they are now looking to tie the knot next year and will fly first-class to Australia for their honeymoon.

Working Will Keep Us Grounded

Sarah also revealed that they have moved quickly to put a deposit down on a new-build house in their home town of Snodland near Maidstone. It has five bedrooms and is expected to be ready by March or April 2019. “For months every evening we have been walking our dog, Ralph, past this development of beautiful homes, joking that if we won the lottery we’d move there. And now we have, and now we will.”

They both love their jobs and have no plans to quit as they believe that working will keep them grounded, but they are thinking about setting up their own business or investing in property. Sarah added: “You don’t want to take it for granted because it’s a lot of money but you’ve got to use it wisely.”

The Lotto Millionaire Raffle guarantees that one Lotto player will win £1 million in every draw. Another 20 codes, each worth £20,000, are also randomly selected every Wednesday and Saturday. You are automatically entered into the Lotto Raffle when you buy a ticket, with a random code generated for each line of numbers you pick. The Lotto jackpot for the next draw will also be £9.6 million and you can take part online or by visiting any authorised retailer.