Taco Bell apologises for rejected Vita winners

Dozens of customers at food chain Taco Bell received codes saying they’d won PS Vitas but failed to receive their prizes.

Taco Bell told CBS 13 that someone ‘tampered’ with their competition, which means winning messages were incorrectly sent to entrants who hadn’t actually won. They later received emails informing them they wouldn’t be receiving a PS Vita.

The restaurant chain says it will send apology emails to affected customers.

We have learned that during a short period of time on January 30th, some people entering our ‘Unlock the Box’ promotion erroneously received a message suggesting they had won a PlayStation Vita, pending verification,” read a Taco Bell statement.

It was confirmed these entrants viewed these messages as a result of others who attempted to gain illegal entry and defraud the system. Unfortunately, during this time period some saw a confirmation screen but were not valid winners. We are therefore giving those consumers who viewed erroneous messages a second chance to win by automatically entering them into a separate draw to win a PS Vita.”

Consumer attorney Eric Ratinoff argued that the company has a responsibility to deliver the prizes.

If Taco Bell had a problem with the way they ran their own sweepstakes, that should be their own problem,” he said.

The contest will continue through to March 11th.