She Read the Fine Print. And Got an Easy $10K

A Florida travel insurance company has awarded a Georgia high school teacher $10,000 for reading the fine print in a policy she recently purchased, the AP reports. A Squaremouth statement says Donelan Andrews claimed the prize 23 hours after the contest began. The St. Petersburg-based company says it launched the secret contest Feb. 11. Buried in the fine print was a promise of $10,000 for the first person to send an email to a specific address. Squaremouth says it planned to give the money to charity if no one read the "pays to read" notice tucked away in its policy, but it wasn't getting by Andrews, who tells the Tampa Bay Times she makes a point of reading the fine print.

"The main reason I always do it is that I went to the University of Georgia and I majored in consumer economics," she says. "So it’s always been a passion of mine to be consumer aware, and particularly, not to be taken advantage of. I even read that HIPAA document they give you at the doctor’s office." Besides the $10,000 for Andrews, Squaremouth now plans to give another $10,000 to a children's literacy charity, plus $5,000 each to the two schools where Andrews teaches consumer economics. Andrews says she applied for retirement a week before winning the contest. The prize will fund a trip to Scotland with her husband to celebrate their 35th wedding anniversary.

(More fine print stories.)