Blames 'computer glitch'
SEATTLE, Wa. — A North Seattle man couldn't believe his eyes. His ticket in the lottery's Veteran's Raffle was a winner.
He checked the numbers, and then checked them again. "I was so excited! I couldn't believe I had won the lottery!" he said.
The problem is, he didn't. What he thought was a $1,000 winner was a dud.
"I got up early and went to the lottery office, and they told me my ticket was invalid," he said.
Lottery officials say a computer glitch posted the wrong numbers online Wednesday night. The numbers posted were not the numbers actually drawn.
"Unfortunately, those are not winning tickets and, by state law, we cannot honor any of them," said lottery spokesman Arlen Harris.
Marketed as "the easiest way to win $1 million," tickets for the raffle were $10 each and the proceeds benefit veterans causes in the state.
Lottery officials believe there are 131 bad tickets out there. They concede there may also be people out there who thought they lost after checking numbers last night and are actually winners. One of them could have thrown away $1 million. The million dollar winner has not yet come forward.
"We are terribly sorry about this," said Harris. "We are bringing in a third party to audit our system to make sure this never happens again and that people retain their faith in the state lottery."
Lottery Post has the full set of correct numbers posted online at its Washington Lottery Results page.
Now I would go in the dumpster for one of those $1.000.000 winners.....
Just don't get stuck.
In fact if there wasnt so much rain there, I would leave now and become a dumpster diver.....
Im bringing my cell phone...... In case I get trapped.......
fogot to charge battery
makes you wanna hold on to them tickets a little longer
Im all seriousness, this stuff is very upsetting. There is no way a state lottery should publish an entire list of wrong numbers without anyone noticing.
I personally publish dozens of raffle results every year here at Lottery Post. I am just one person, and it's a lot of work. But still, every time I publish the results the first thing I do is to open the Web page myself and verify that everything is correct. If I find an error, I correct it immediately.
So you're telling me that a state lottery with employees dedicated to this stuff cannot spend a few extra minutes to get everything perfect?
I am sure the employee who published the wrong numbers is absolutely mortified by their mistake. But it should never happen in the first place. If I can do it, and still run the rest of this entire site/business, then certainly lottery employees who don't have quite so many responsibilities can do it.
You don't need to hire a professional auditor to do this, as was suggested by the lottery spokesman. You simply need to ensure that people LOOK AT WHAT THEY PUBLISH AFTER THEY FINISH PUBLISHING IT.
One meticulous individual versus 10 casual "so called" professionals produces a clear winner every time.
Detail oriented is obviously not a competency required for that job!
If that ticket goes unclaimed heads need to roll on this one
Washington State recently passed the law making marijuna legal. Could be those officials took a " recreational smoke break" before posting
those losers.
Computer glitch, they blamed it on the computer anyway!!
No one here likes RNG for lottos, maybe they should go back to the good old
fashion raffels where they hand pick the numbers and someone writes them down
or someone hand pick names, ya can't mess up names right? lol and two people double check,
I don't know...
To see those numbers on the screen, wake up early to go to the lotto office only to find out you
did not win, what an awful feeling!! The numbers should stay as they are, unless the computer
picked numbers not on the list at all.
I hope VA & CT did'nt do this. Mine are in the woodstove.
We've gotten used to a lot of things that used to piss us off.
We've been kinda conditioned to expect gross negligence and incompetence at the fast food drive-up window.
And mailmen not being able to distinguish between one address and another when they deliver the mail.
And libs having vehicles backed up for a mile behind them as they drive slow in the passing lane.
But this... publishing the wrong numbers and saying you're going to call in an auditing firm to make sure you don't screw things up again...
Now that would really piss me off if I had a ticket with winning numbers they published in error due to their utter incompetence.
There's no excuse for this , they should all be fired.
That stinks ,..............they should give those people something for that blunder,Maybe a choice thousand bucks or a kilo.lol
All of a sudden I dont feel so stupid for hoarding all those losers in my shoebox.
When the NYL rolled out their new website several years ago, they also didn't snag all the bugs.
For almost five days they were posting the wrong results!!!
I am one of those people who watch the draws everyday, and when I went to the computer I was all confused for about a week and all my charts were in disarray.
I remember thinking oh boy. Somebody is gonna throw away a 5 thousand dollar winner!
Very distressing indeed.
Those people who were shafted should get a free steak dinner at sizzler or something.
Because the chance the million dollar winner is gonna come forward is very slim, because many people dont hoard their lottery tickets the way I do.
A kilo of what??
Jumbo shrimp?
I keep all of my losing tickets so I can write off the losses against any wins. So I would still have that raffle ticket but I know most people probably tear trash / throw away any ticket they find to be losers...even those that those ticket scanners indicate are either invalid or losers (I always check tickets using at least 2 sources and knew the scanner was wrong).
Raffles stink!
I like the shoebox idea...... I vow that my losers will never see the bottom of a dumpster.....
A kilo of the states finest grade of:
Medical Marijuana (Cannabis) :: Washington State Dept. of Health
If a guy went to all the trouble of driving down to the lottery office with a losing ticket I think he should get a hat or perhaps a t-shirt that will display his love and loyalty to the state lottery......
This should help promote my idea that ALL losing tickets should ALWAYS be in a raffle to win $1 million.
This would have solved the problem, because the clerk could have said "Your not a loser yet"
Nonsense pay these people .. very shameful to bigin with .. How many mistakes have cause people not to win ?
Agree, that people who's hopes were screwed, should be rewarded: 10% from the winning sum that was screwed!
They should take class action.
I'm cosigning on your comment LottoBoner - I agree, that people who think they are winners based on the lottery's mistake should be compensated in someway. The least the Lottery should do is pay up with something, the most they should do is send out an advertisement right away to make players aware of the mistake. Maybe some folk can salvage those tickets in a hurry and go and claim those funds.
You best believe if the rolls were reversed and a lottlery winner owed the state 1 penny, they'd be coming after them with a vengance - charging interest, and penalties and fees. A person can tell them a thousand times over, that... hey it was an honest mistake. I inadvertantly keyed in a 6 when it should have been a 9. Yea, I owe you 3 dollars in tax money, but the state will never allow leniency.
We need to watch who we choose to make the rules. Let's go on a Lottery Strike Washington State. Let them know they need to pay up.
You think the administrative lottery folk are cheating? I know I'm ranting, but I hate when the state lottery cheats.
I'm pretty sure the correct answer to that question is almost none.
The person responsible should be FIRED!There is NO excuse for this kind of mistake...NONE!