Yesterday Mike posted on Twitter that his prize had been reduced to just £2,000! confused? yes so was I, so I fired off a email to both Barry Hearn and Jason Ferguson lastnight.  at 8:30am Barry Hearn was on the phone to explain how the rolling prize pot worked and that it was actually split into 3 pots, one for major ranking events, one for pre TV stages of major ranking events and another for the last 128 of the PTC’s and no pot for what is classed as the amateur part (rounds before the last 128) of the PTC as these matches were not overseen by referee’s.

Barry also confirmed that the initial statement which is above was a mistake by World Snooker’s press office and has now been removed form the website.

At 10am Jason Ferguson sent me an email which is below;

On Mike Dunn making his 147 there seemed to be some confusion as to how
the prize pots operate. I think it is fair to say that perhaps our original
statement about the introduction of these exciting new prizes lacked some
of detail.

On behalf of Mike Dunn I have looked in to this further and it is clear
that there are a total of three rolling prizes. The first is the TV stages
of a major ranking event rolling over if not won at £5000.00 per event.
There is a further £500.00 per event for the PTC and pre TV stages. This is
split in to two pots as follows £500.00 per PTC event rolling over through
the PTC series and £500.00 per event rolling over for the pre TV stages of
major ranking events. I would also like to clarify that the PTC prize can
only be won from the last 128 stages as it is only at this stage that
referees are involved in proceedings.

As for the statement on our web site it was Mike Dunn who drew this to my
attention. Mikes 147 prize should have read £2000.00 as this is 4 x £500.00
as the German Masters the fourth event without a 147 being made. This is
also the way previous prizes were paid. This statement was taken down and
on behalf of WPBSA and World Snooker I have personally apologised to Mike
for the misleading statement.

So where do we stand now? well the prize pos’s are now clear to see but this does not sort out the fact that a player was told he was getting £3,500 and is now only receiving £2,000.  Jason has personally and now publicly apologised for the confussion in a statement just made on WorldSnooker.com which you can see below;

WPBSA Chairman Jason Ferguson said: “We apologise for any confusion on these prizes caused by previous statements, and I have personally apologised to Mike Dunn on this matter. Hopefully the situation regarding the rolling prizes is now clear.”

Full statement is here - http://www.worldsnooker.com/page/NewsArticles/0,,13165~2533810,00.html

Clearly a mistake has been made and apologised for but this does not overcome the fact that Mike Dunn was told that he would get £3,500 and then 7 days later get told he would only be getting £2,000 at this point what should happen and what will happen are two things separated by £1,500

It is clear that Mike will get £2,000 but should be also be entitled to the £1,500?

If the mistake was rectified within 48hours by World Snooker then I would say that a apology for putting the incorrect prize money up on their website would of been sufficient but it has taken 7 days to rectify this so it is my belief that he is entitled to the additional £1,500 as a sign of good will and financial apology for the mistake.

As for David Gray’s 147 in the amateur rounds of PTC 10 he will receive no prize.