The woman who’s won it all playing competitions
Her enthusiasm for competitions has landed Rebecca Beesley prizes worth tens of thousands of pounds and a string of money-can’t-buy experiences. But the mum-of-three tells Lydia Chantler-Hicks a dark spell saw the hobby turn into an addiction which took o
Like most mums, Rebecca Beesley was desperate to give her children a holiday to remember. Strapped for cash, she took the difficult decision to sell gold jewellery left to her by her late mum so she could take her young family on a muchneeded break to Shorefield Park in the New Forest.
At the end of their stay, she scribbled down a review on a questionnaire left in their room.
She was delighted and utterly surprised when an envelope landed on her doormat months later, thanking her for her survey, and informing her she had won a free family stay.
Little did she know it then, but a decade later, Rebecca would be winning thousands of pounds worth of prizes, including holidays to Mexico and Dubai, through entering free competitions.
But “comping” would also turn into an addiction, leaving her skipping meals and showers as she sought the buzz of winning.
“I didn’t have many opportunities growing up
- I’m from a single-parent household and quite a poor background,” said the 41-yearold. “As a child I’d see things advertised on food wrappers and think ‘wow, people can win cars and things’.
“My comping started when my daughter was born in 2012. I needed a stroller, so was entering every competition for buggies I could find - then I won one!
“I was home-schooling my boys then, and in the evenings I started entering competitions as a way of unwinding.” Between 2012 and 2015, Rebecca won a staggering £50,000 worth of prizes including about £30,000 of holidays, along with smaller items like baby equipment, books, and cosmetics.
But with her success, the hobby began to grow out of hand.
“It becomes a vicious circle,” she said. “If you start getting wins, it can be hard to see a competition and not enter. “I had a bad spell when I’d enter everything I could find on Facebook. The next night, I’d spend about five hours just going through the previous day’s competitions to check there was nothing I’d won and missed.”
At one point during her early comping years, Rebecca was winning a prize every day, on average. “But I was probably the unhappiest I’ve ever been in my life,” she said.
“I was actually skipping showers, skipping meals, just to get in a few more competitions.
“It had become like a proper addiction.
“It feels wrong to compare