March, 18, 2013 (DUBAI, UAE) –– The Western Union Company (NYSE: WU), a leader in global financial services, has found the quirkiest gift stories by means of a radio competition and rewarded the winner with a ticket back home.
The competition named “The Gift of Possibility” which was run on Europa Plus radio, asked listeners to cite examples of the funniest and most unusual gift they had received. The ‘gift’ received had to make them wish they had been given cash instead.
Gifted items cited by contestants included toilet-paper roll with personalized messages, a slide show of the most absurd and awkward pictures shown to fifty other people in a room and identical shoes, however both for the right foot!
Mr. Sergey Lyakhevich, narrated the story of his friends giving him a two-sided book about the history of the UAE in Arabic and Chinese. While he did not know the languages, he saw the situation in a humorous light and thought of it as a hint to broaden his language capability.
Those stories won Sergey Lyakhevich and. Victoria Petukhova their real gifts – a return air-ticket to their home country Russia and Kazakhstan. The competition also engaged and informed audiences of Western Union’s latest offering for UAE residents, who can transfer funds to the Eastern Europe and Northwest Asia regions at a reduced fee starting from AED 35*.
“We are pleased to introduce a new fee to the residents of UAE remitting money to Eastern Europe and Northwest Asia regions. Western Union has recognized an increase in the need for a reliable and efficient means of transferring money to these regions.” said Sobia Rahman, regional vice president Pakistan and Afghanistan, Western Union.
“We have stepped in to fill the gap and the latest radio competition proved to generate greater awareness of our plan, while creating some fun about gifting – which often can range from being wonderful to weird, Our consumer analysis often shows that gifting of cash is preferred over physical gifts” she said.
Mr. Sergey Lyakhevich, said, “Participating in this competition was a lot of fun and thanks to Western Union, a gift which I thought was useless to me, turned out to be the reason behind a complimentary trip back home.”
