The People’s Postcode Lottery will award an extra £2m to the 40 charities it supports after an increase in players left it with uncommitted income.
The lottery has now awarded £43.3m to charities and good causes since its launch in 2008 with players contributing 50p from every £2 ticket.
The 40 charities, including Maggie’s, the Canal and River Trust and the PDSA, will benefit from an extra £50,000 this year, which is being awarded as an unrestricted lump sum.
Money for good causes is distributed to charities and community projects through seven grantmaking trusts, including the People’s Postcode Trust, the Postcode Care Trust, and the Postcode Green Trust.
A spokeswoman said the trustees of the grantmaking trusts recognised that charities were struggling and wanted to use the uncommitted £2m income to give them a boost. She said the money had come from “tremendous growth of player numbers”.
In January, the lottery announced it had increased the amount of money it gives to good causes to 25 per cent of each ticket after a record 61 per cent increase in ticket sales last year.
This is up from almost 22.5 per cent of all tickets sold being donated to good causes in 2013 when £10m was given to charities.
The lottery plans to continue to increase the proportion of ticket sales going to good causes.
Clara Govier, head of charities at the lottery, said: “As the number of players continues to increase the amounts awarded to charities will only continue to rise.”
This year, the lottery’s good causes have extended to include organisations operating overseas including British Red Cross and War Child.
The lottery involves people paying for their postcodes to be entered into regular lotteries. When someone’s postcode is selected, everyone with tickets in that postcode wins a prize.
The People’s Postcode Lottery and its sister lotteries in the Netherlands and Sweden, are said to be the second largest charitable private donor in the world, with £441m awarded to good causes between them in 2013, after the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
