The latest season of The Amazing Race just came to an end and many of the contestants that didn’t win the grand prize are still walking away with exciting vacations as prizes.
At the end of each episode, the winner of each “leg” of the race wins a special prize, with most of them being a free vacation to a foreign location.
A former contestant has revealed the surprising truth about those prizes and why some people never even go on the trips that they win.
Keep reading to find out more…
Season 21 contestant Mark “Abba” Abbattista chatted with AV Club in 2013 and explained how the trips aren’t technically “free,” even though they’re a prize.
“You don’t get to go on any of your trips till after your season airs. The trips are sponsored through whatever hotel puts up the trip and Travelocity is also a sponsor, so you have a liaison you go through. When the season is over, you do a bunch of legal paperwork then they turn you over to Travelocity,” Abba said. “The woman I dealt with there was really helpful and nice and I wound up going on the trips and, yes, you pay taxes because it’s considered income as a prize. So if the trip is worth $10,000, guess what? You owe Uncle Sam $3,500. And they’re not all-inclusive. Your air is paid for and your hotel and they include some other things, like massages or a snorkel trip, but all the food is not included. So you’re spending money and going to places that you’re not necessarily interested in.”
While Travelocity was once the show’s partner, Expedia is the current travel partner.
Abba added, “I don’t know if a lot of people never use the trip or not, because it is an expense and not everyone has the resources to do that. It sounds good in theory, but I think a fair amount of them don’t get used. Of course, if you win the money, you can use the money to pay the taxes, and if you win a car, you can sell the car, which I think a lot of people do. I think a lot of people that go on these game shows might not be sophisticated enough to know that ahead of time. You think you’re winning, but it’s like, ‘Hold on. If I flew there myself, it would have cost me $300, but you booked a ticket and told me it’s a $6,000 flight.’”