GMTV announced last night it had terminated its contract with the company that ran its phone-in competition lines as it apologised to viewers over allegations that they had been fleeced out of money.

According to BBC’s Panorama, some callers and texters to the breakfast TV channel stood no chance of winning as shortlists of potential winners had been finalised “long before” phone lines closed.

GMTV said it had terminated its contract with Opera Interactive Technology with immediate effect after its own inquiries had revealed “irregularities” in the system the service provider was operating.

It also said it was determined to reimburse viewers who had lost out by entering the quizzes, and its competitions were suspended until further notice.

The latest controversy comes as new rules on TV quizzes were announced yesterday by the media watchdog, Ofcom. It has revised the guidelines after discovering the methodologies used to calculate the correct answers to some questions were unclear.

Ofcom has censured ITV Play’s Quizmania show for including a balaclava and Rawlplugs in a test of 12 things you are most likely to find in a woman’s handbag, while a maths question on ITV Play proved so difficult that even an Oxford University professor was unable to solve it.

Ofcom has now revised the guidelines after investigating a sample of the controversial quizzes.

The new rules mean “the correct solution to any quiz should be reasonable (ie, not unfairly obscure) and certain”.

Ofcom said: “The methodology must be clear, comprehensive and precise.”

The changes will come into immediate effect.

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