ITV faces record £4million fine over game show rip-offs

The media regulator Ofcom is lining up its biggest-ever sanction on a TV company over the fake competition scandals on some of its biggest shows.

Viewers of hit shows such as Ant and Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway wasted almost £8million in phone charges over three years as they joined competitions in which the winners had already been chosen.

Scroll down for more....

Other shows, including Gameshow Marathon, were also found to have duped their viewers.

Ofcom is lining up the unprecedented punishment to send out the message to broadcasters, once and for all, to clean up their act.

The fine will beat the previous record of £2million, imposed on GMTV last year after it ripped off viewers by up to £40million with its phone-ins.

Although the financial value of its offences is smaller, ITV is expected to get a considerably bigger fine because of the sheer number of shows which deceived viewers.

A report by City consultants Deloitte, covering 2005 to 2007, revealed that some programmes regularly pre-selected winners while calls from viewers were still coming in.

On other shows, votes were simply ignored. It said some 8.57million callers were eligible for refunds.

The programmes involved included I'm A Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here, The X Factor, Dancing On Ice and Soapstar Superstar.

The scandal was so serious and widespread that at one stage it was even suggested that the Serious Fraud Office would be called in.

Yesterday a senior ITV insider revealed that, while the final fine could be anywhere between £2millionand £4million, it was expected to be at the top end.

The channel is trying to persuade Ofcom to be merciful but last night the mood was pessimistic.

The insider said: "This is something we have tried to mitigate ourselves, but we are preparing to take it on the chin.

"We have been into the meeting and made our case. They have said it will be up to £4million."

ITV has already said it expects the scandal to cost it £18million.

This includes the £2million cost of the Deloitte report, a £7.8million fund set up to repay viewers and the £8million it was paying out for the GMTV scandal.

ITV's annual profits plummeted by 35 per cent this year to £ 188million - partly due to a £58million loss on phone rip-offs which forced the closure of the late-night ITV Play channel.

After the scandal was exposed, ITV executive chairman Michael Grade called for "zero-tolerance" for fakery.

He admitted the investigation process had been "painful and costly" and said the report made "deeply uncomfortable reading".

But the broadcaster has refused to release the Deloitte report in full, saying it contains "commercially sensitive information".

There have been allegations that Mr Grade wanted to censor parts of the probe.

The report was particularly damaging for Ant and Dec - Anthony McPartlin and Declan Donnelly - after it was revealed that their Saturday Night Takeaway was responsible for about half of the cash viewers lost, about £4million.

The pair are listed as executive producers on the show, meaning, in theory, that they have responsibility for overseeing how it is made.

But they claimed to be unaware of the phone-in scams as they issued an apology.

Both ITV and Ofcom refused to comment last night. The regulator's final report will be published within weeks.