South Carolina Lottery: S.C. Lottery posts wrong numbers; causes pay off problemsWhen Roy Corbitt went to collect on a winning lottery ticket, he was expecting a payout of $9 or $10.
"I know I had three numbers. I didn't really know I had four. That's why I was shocked when they guy said, 'you won $600'."
When Corbitt went to the lottery claims office to collect his winnings, he was told that there was a problem with his ticket.
He wasn't alone.
Corbitt said several people also came to claim their money. "A lot them had $600 or $700 like I did," Corbitt explained.
But instead of collecting his money, Corbitt was told to go home. "They said we had to come back and they wouldn't tell us why. They just said there was a problem."
Tony Cooper with the South Carolina Lottery later said there was a problem stemming from a mistake on the Friday night's Palmetto Cash Five lottery drawing.
"The auditor certified the number 37 as one of the winning numbers when actually the number drawn was 27," Cooper explained.
Calls started pouring into the lottery office on Monday morning.
"People who actually watched the drawing saw the number 27, but 37 was justified in the system," Cooper said.
A flaw in the system caused the lottery to pay off all the winners: those with the winning number 27 and the incorrectly posted number 37. "The mistake that was made by the auditors resulted in the number being paid twice."
That's just fine with Corbitt. He's now changed his payoff from just a few dollars to hundreds because of human error. "Today's my lucky day, I'm going to buy me some lottery tickets."
Players who have the winning numbers on Friday night's Palmetto Cash Five lottery ticket including either as number 27 or 37 can go to the lottery's claim office on Gervais Street in Columbia.
The winning numbers were: 8 - 14 - 15 - 27 (or 37) - 31, PowerUp 2.
