Telcos take slice of DWTS text profits before charity

Naz Khanjani and her dance partner, Shae, pictured after being told they were voted off on Monday night. Photo / Supplied

They're dancing their hearts out for charities, but just how much of the pie the charities are getting remains unclear.

Viewers have been questioning the voting system ever since Naz Khanjani was eliminated from Dancing With The Stars on Monday night, given she could move pretty well around the dance floor.

Mediaworks confirmed the voting system was based on a 50-50 split voting system - so just because the judges might cast you in good light, the public need to as well.

"The judges' scores and the audience text votes have an equal weighting when ranking the contestants," explained a spokesperson for Three.

Each of the well-known New Zealanders is raising money for their own chosen charity. Khanjani had chosen Make-A-Wish-Foundation. Monday night's surprise winner, Chris Harris, is dancing for NZ Foundation for Conductive Education.

When questioned about how much of the 99c for each text vote the charity gets, a Mediaworks spokesperson said they did not retain any of the money.

"Net proceeds from the text-to-vote mechanism go to the contestants' nominated charities. MediaWorks does not retain any money from the text votes however we can't speak on behalf of the telecommunication companies which deduct service provider charges from the cost of voting.

"Given this is for charity, we feel strongly that as much of the proceeds as possible should go to the wonderful causes supported by the show."

The country's three biggest telcos, Vodafone, Spark and 2 Degrees, have all been approached for comment.

A 2 Degrees spokeswoman said they couldn't comment about how much of the 99c was taken by the company as it was "commercially sensitive" information.

However, she addled service provider, Connexus, also took a cut for its services.

A Spark spokeswoman said they also couldn't provide a breakdown but said its cut was a "minority proportion".

She said it's rate was its "standard wholesale rate for a premium text" service.

Each week, the Dancing With The Stars contestants start with a clean slate, meaning votes and judges scores from the previous week no longer matter.

If you want your star or charity to make it through the next round, fire off your vote.

For more details on Mediaworks voting system click here.