A grandmother won £416,949 on People’s Postcode Lottery after a spiritualist told her to 'expect a Christmas surprise'. Deborah Clymer, 66, went to a meeting at a spiritualist church this summer when she was given the cryptic message.
And she remembered it after she and husband Brian, 78, got a call to say she’d bagged the bumper windfall when the lottery’s biggest-ever single prize of £18.3m landed in Tiverton, Devon.
Deborah said: “I went to a spiritualist church in the summer, and I got a message from my mum. At the end, the spiritualist asked if she could give me a hug and said, ‘you’re going to have a wonderful Christmas. You have a big surprise coming’.
“When this happened, I thought, ‘oh my God, that’s what she meant’.”
She added: “I can do so much good with this. This will be life changing for so many people. I can do so much to help the family…so, so much.”
Deborah was one of three players in Tiverton to collect the top amounts after EX16 6TX was announced as the full winning postcode in the lottery’s Postcode Millions prize on Saturday, December 12. Every ticket was worth £416,949.
A further 819 players in the wider postcode sector of EX16 6 picked up cheques ranging from £18,592 to £74,368, depending on the number of tickets they played with. Deborah won the whopping amount after playing Postcode Lottery for just one month.
She signed up in November after being inspired by her sister, a friend – and seeing the lottery’s TV advert. It means that, so far, she has only shelled out one monthly payment of £12.25.
She said: “My sister said to me that she’d won on Postcode Lottery, and I said ‘I’ve never done that. Then my friend won and I saw the advert on television. I thought, you know what? I’m going to do the Postcode Lottery and straight off I got a ticket.
“I literally just signed up in November and then I got a call last Tuesday to tell me I’d won and I just thought it had to be a hoax.
She added: “I’ve just paid for one ticket…this is amazing. I can’t believe what that one ticket has got us. We are absolutely blown away. I thought I might win every now and again. This has been a whirlwind.”
Retired postie Brian said: “We had no conception it would be this amount of money. To win that quickly is inconceivable and damn lucky as well.”
And Deborah – who shares six children and seven grandchildren with Brian – told of another amazing twist of fate that might have kiboshed their new fortune. They have put their smart detached villa up for sale in the hope of moving to Torquay to be near family.
Relieved Deborah said: “Can you imagine if we’d sold and didn’t get this?”
Deborah fought back tears and held onto handsome Old English Sheepdog Ludo as lottery ambassador Matt Johnson presented her cheque. Now she and Brian – who have recently celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary - are planning to help their family.
She said: “I don’t want it for me, but we can do so much good with it. I’m blown away and feel quite emotional. But I’m not going to cry because my mascara will run. We’ve got everything that we want…we’ve got a roof over our heads. We say to the children not to buy us Christmas or birthday presents. There’s nothing we need or want.
“I’ve always said I’m a millionaire anyway. I’ve got healthy children and grandchildren and I’m healthy. We’ll give the family money. I think they could all do with it. We’d like to take them all to the Lake District because we have so many happy memories up there and we’ve been saying we’d love to go back.”
She added: “Christmas is so special to all of us. This one’s going to be amazing. With all the sadness and rotten stuff in the world, Christmas makes you stop and appraise.”
She did reveal she hankers for touring a special corner of the UK. Deborah said: “We want to do a tour of Scotland.”
Brian added: “We wanted to go on a cruise round the Med, but it got cancelled by Covid. We might do that.” And she laughed and said, as 18-month-old Ludo sat at her feet: “I can get another dog as well.”
Deborah also told how they are keen to help charities, including cancer organisations and the Royal National Lifeboat Institution. Brian used to do offshore power boat racing and was rescued twice in the past by the RNLI. Deborah said: “Anything that makes people aware of the charities is a good thing.”
Directly opposite the Clymers, Dan Tapp, 42, and his wife Danielle tightly hugged and kissed each other when his £416,979 cheque was revealed. Then his mum Shirley Tapp turned up with a sealed envelope containing a prediction for their win – and revealed she had a feeling it would be a biggie.
She originally reckoned they’d get £350,000 - but ended up scribbling down £170,000 and putting it in an envelope and signing it ‘mum’s prediction’. Retired Shirley, 72, said: “From the very beginning I had a feeling about this. I’m slightly psychic, I think.
“I wanted to make the figure much higher, but I thought I’d put my sensible head on. My husband said I wasn’t to get too excited, so I made it much less.”
Engineer Dan embraced the lottery’s Matt and wife Danielle and lifted them off their feet with excitement when the enormity of the win started to sink in. Now he and NHS manager Danielle, 37 - who bought the detached villa in the quiet cul-de-sac just six months ago - want to take their two young kids to Lapland next year - and treat the whole family to a Disney holiday.
Dan said: “Aren’t we glad we moved here. This is absolutely life changing. I don’t know what to say. It’s unbelievable.”
Danielle said: “We’ll take our children to Lapland and Disney, and we can take our families with us, too.”
Dan added: “It’s all about family. Christmas is going to be amazing, and the turkeys are definitely on us.”
The couple were overjoyed to learn that their wins mean hundreds of people in the wider postcode area also got a Christmas bonus. Danielle said: “We’re so happy for everyone else in the town who’s won. Small businesses might benefit from people spending more before Christmas.”
Dan added: “It’s best to win with other people. It means we’re able to share it with friends. There are probably people we know who have won as well and we’ll be able to celebrate with them. What a day for town, for us, friends and family. Let’s go and have a nice party. It still hasn’t sunk in.”
The big winners joined hundreds of others at a special event in the town’s 400-year-old Blundell’s School. Davina McCall – who starred in the lottery’s festive telly ad – helped ambassadors Matt, Judie McCourt and Danyl Johnson to host the special morning. And ‘Greatest Day’ singer Beverley Knight got the party started.
And it was déjà vu for one of those other winners. Tom Stevens pocketed £18,592 - 11 years after winning £25,000 on the Postcode Lottery. Tom, 40, said: “It’s unbelievable. How could lightning possibly strike twice? And it has. The first time I won it all went on a deposit for a house. It was absolutely amazing. And I can’t quite believe it has happened again almost exactly 11 years to the day.”
Tom received a £25,000 cheque after winning on December 15, 2014. But despite scoring the hefty windfall, his family and friends thought he should have given up his lottery ticket years ago. He said: “Lots of my family and friends told me I should cancel Postcode Lottery. They all said, ‘you’ll never win again’.
“But I really like supporting the charities and I know it was possible to win because it actually happened.”
Tom, who works at tech giant Dyson, added: “When I won the first time I took a selfie with my cheque, and it was in the newspaper the next day as ‘the £25,000 selfie’.” After his prize was revealed, Tom had to rush back to finish his shift, cheque-in-hand and his head spinning with spending ideas.
He said: “I’m not sure just yet, as I wasn’t expecting this much. But I was going to take my nieces to Disneyland, so I think that’s definitely going to happen now. I’ve already got my house, so this is just spending money now.”
And he said it was a huge boost for the town, adding: “It changed my life, so I know how much this will do for other people.” Biker Andrew Gear, 65, won £37,184 thanks to playing with two tickets - and he also picked up an £18,592 cheque for his father-in-law, who was in hospital. The windfall means Andrew will buy his eighth motorbike, and one that he’s always wanted - a classic BSA Gold Star.
Andrew says his celebrations will go on for weeks. He said: “I’ve just retired last week, and it’s my birthday the day after Boxing Day, this couldn’t get any better. It’s incredible.”
Davina said: “I’m so excited to be in beautiful Tiverton to join in the celebrations with hundreds of our Postcode Lottery winners. Congratulations to everyone. It’s amazing to win at any time of the year, but to share the lottery’s biggest-ever single prize - a massive £18.3m - just two weeks before Christmas is extra-special.
“To date players have raised more than £1.5 billion for charities and good causes, which is an incredible milestone!"
She added: “Now let’s get the Millions party started. Christmas has come early for our Tiverton winners, and I know that each and every one of them is going to have a ho-ho-whole lot of fun.”
