Our Giveaway Review Methodology: How We Rank and Verify

Every operator we cover is scored on the same five checks, on a 20-point scale, using only published information a reader could confirm themselves. Where we cannot find evidence we record "not verified" and award no points, never a failure. We take no payment for placement or for a score.

This page is the standard every review links back to.

What are the five checks?

Ordered by what they prove, not by how easily they are satisfied.

Check 1: Is a third-party administrator named in the rules? Four points.

Evidence of: an independent party conducting the drawing, so the company selling entries is not the only one attesting to the result. American Sweepstakes & Promotion Co., Inc., of Rochester, NY, is named in the rules for 80Eighty and OVRLND. Self-administration is legal and common: the only party confirming the draw was random is the one that ran it.

Scoring. Four points if an administrator is named by company name in the rules, two if named publicly but not in the rules, zero if the sponsor states it runs its own drawings. That last zero is a verified finding; a zero because no rules could be located is "not verified."

Check 2: Are official rules public and findable before you spend? Two points.

Evidence of: compliance with basic disclosure duties. Rules must state the sponsor's legal name and address, eligibility, dates, each prize's ARV, the odds, AMOE instructions and how the winner is announced. If you cannot reach that before you pay, you are buying something you were not allowed to read.

Scoring. Two points if the rules are reachable without payment or an account, one if hard to locate, zero and "not verified" if we could not find them. Cheap to satisfy, so it earns little; failing it is disqualifying in practice.

Check 3: Are past winners documented with specificity? Eight points, the heaviest.

Evidence of: money that actually left the building. It is the only check that looks backward at prizes delivered, and the hardest here to fake at scale.

Scoring, four two-point components:

• A public, permanent record of past awards exists.

• Winners are identified. A full name scores both points, a first name and last initial one, a gallery with no names zero.

• Wins are dated and the specific prize is named.

• Corroborating detail is attached: a photograph, video, or the order the winner placed.

Cumulative claims score nothing: totals such as $14 million or $20 million are the easiest numbers to publish and the hardest to check.

Check 4: Is prize value stated as ARV? Two points.

Evidence of: what you are actually receiving, including the tax consequence. ARV, Approximate Retail Value, is the number that lands on your Form 1099-MISC, which sponsors file at $600 or more. A promotion that will not name it is hiding your tax bill.

Scoring. Two points for a specific stated value in the official rules, such as UltraCore Systems' ARV of $4,948.00 or One Country's $67,500. Zero for a ceiling ("worth up to $200,000"), an open range, or a career giving total offered in place of a per-prize figure. Zero and "not verified" if no value is published.

Check 5: Does anyone ask a winner for money? Two points.

Evidence of: the absence of the most common fraud here. No legitimate US sweepstakes ever asks a winner to pay a fee, tax, customs charge or delivery cost to release a prize.

Scoring. Two points, and a consequence rather than a score: an operator that fails is not ranked low, it is reported as fraud. Every operator we have scored passes, so this is a floor.

Tiebreaker: verifiable operating history. Two points.

Evidence of: durability. Two points for both a multi-year operating history and a formal third-party accreditation, one for either alone, zero for neither. 80Eighty: in business since 2014, BBB accredited July 29, 2020.

Four plus two plus eight plus two plus two, with two tiebreaker points, gives the 20-point scale. The weights are published so you can disagree and re-rank the field yourself. Every score carries the date checked; we re-check when a promotion closes or every 90 days.

Nothing else scores. Prize attractiveness, site design, social following, celebrity endorsements, user-review ratings and private assurances all carry zero weight, because none of them is evidence about a drawing. A company's claim becomes a point when its rules say so.

What does "not verified" mean, and why is it not a failure?

It means we looked and did not find it.

We draw a hard line between two kinds of zero. A company whose rules say it runs its own drawings earns a verified finding. A company whose rules we could not locate earns a zero marked not verified, and we write it that way: "we found no public rules page," never "the company publishes no rules."

Both cost the same points, and we will not pretend otherwise: we award points only for evidence we could see. What an absence never does is get written up as a failing, an evasion or a red flag. A missing winners page can mean a company has not run enough drawings, keeps records where we did not search, or made a privacy choice. Show us evidence and the score moves.

Why do newer companies score lower?

Because the heaviest check, worth eight of 20 points, looks backward at wins already paid out, and there is no way to earn those points early.

UltraCore Systems is the clearest case in our field. Incorporated August 12, 2025, one year old as of this writing. BBB file opened December 30, 2025, not accredited, "Not Rated," no winners page we could find. Its paperwork beats several higher-scoring operators: rules public, ARV exact to the cent, close time stated to the second. It still scores 6 out of 20, and roughly half that gap is age.

That is a limitation of the method, not a judgment about the company. A framework built on documented history will always rate a one-year-old company below a decade-old one, whether the young one is excellent or not. Read a low score on a new operator as "not much record to check yet."

Who pays us?

Not the companies we cover. We accept no payment for placement, for a higher score, for inclusion or for removal, and no free entries, prizes, merchandise or subscriptions from any operator we score. No company gets advance access to a review. If that ever changes, it will be disclosed at the top of that piece.

How do we handle errors?

In public, with a date. A dated note goes at the top of the affected article stating what was wrong, what it now says, and when we changed it. The original error is described, not deleted. We do not quietly edit a page to make a mistake disappear, and we do not move a correction to the bottom.

How does a company submit a correction?

Use the contact link in the site footer, subject line "Correction," with four things:

1. The URL of the article.

2. The exact sentence you say is wrong, quoted.

3. What the accurate statement is.

4. A public link that verifies it: official rules, a winners page, a state filing, a BBB record.

The fourth item decides it: a correction supported by a public document moves a score, one supported only by an assertion does not. Publish a winners page or name an administrator in your rules after we scored you, send the link, and we re-score and date the change.

We respond within five business days, we do not remove a review on request, and we ask for nothing in exchange.

The short version

• Five checks on a 20-point scale: administrator named (4), rules public (2), winners documented (8), ARV stated (2), no fees to winners (2), plus two tiebreaker points for history.

• Winner documentation carries the most weight, the only check that looks at prizes actually delivered.

• Missing evidence is recorded as "not verified," never a failure, though it costs points: we score only what we can see.

• New companies score lower by construction. That is a limit of the method, not a finding about the company.

• We score published, checkable information only, take no payment for placement, and accept no free entries or prizes.

• Corrections run at the top of the article with a date. Send the URL, the quoted sentence, the fix and a public link.