TV game show offers loans as prizes

A new live TV program in Taiwan is offering audiences the chance to win a bank loan -- free of interest.

As more and more media organizations and television programs in Taiwan focus on the sluggish economy, a wide variety of shows have cropped up, seemingly in an effort to address the problem, sporting names like Emergency Unemployment Rescue (搶救失業大作戰) and Employment Master and Financial Management Expert (就業大師理財通).

The new show, TV Bank (電視大銀行), however is the first one that offers bank loans directly to audiences. The production agency will settle the winners' first-year interest payments to attract audiences to participate in the show.

The TV show's producer said that the main purpose of the show was not just to get good ratings, but to help audiences solve their emergency problems.

She admitted, however, that the ability of the show had its limits.

"Some participants can't get a loan just because they are poor. We want to offer those who need help a chance to solve their emergency problems but not their personal financial problems," said Huang Mei-lun (黃美倫), producer of TV Bank.

The show's affiliated bank, Cosmos Bank, said that it has co-operated with the TV program to help promote their bank.

"We just want to advertise the bank's loan services," said an assistant manager from the bank, who wished to remain anonymous.

The show airs from Monday to Friday. During the show, two participants offer their personal profiles to explain why they need loans from the bank. Five judges and votes from the audience decide which participant will win a NT$200,000 loan.

With this there is also a catch. The bank has the right to make a decision on exactly how much winners can loan from the bank, which could amount to between NT$100,000 and NT$800,000, Huang said.

According to Huang, every individual who participates in the show must tell their individual backgrounds and reasons for wanting a loan from the bank.

For instance, one man needed the loan to remove a tattoo from his back to keep his job as a lifeguard, while one female contestant needed money to lose weight to attract the opposite sex.

A senior TV program producer, Lee Chia-mei (李嘉梅), said that it's a good idea to produce this kind of show, but added that she hoped the production team would produce the show with a mature attitude.

"Borrowing is a very private matter and to some people it is a shameful thing," Lee said. But on the other hand, maybe the only thing it will do is to "satisfy audiences' voyeuristic desires to spy on participants' private lives."