Says Iowa and Indiana lotteries 'teamed up' on them
Irate patrons of Paradise Games, a Bahamas web shop, yesterday vowed to "take their business elsewhere" amid accusations the gaming house has refused to reward tens of thousands of dollars in winnings.
The customers, on the request of anonymity, allege after playing numbers and winning nearly $60,000 on one ticket and another $32,000 on an additional ticket in the 'Early Iowa' game, they were "given the run around" by Paradise Games and ultimately told there were "problems" with issuing the money.
The three construction workers also said they suspected the gaming house simply did not want to pay them because the sum of money is substantial. These suspicions rose when 'Early Iowa's' drawings were no longer visible on the web shop's website, the men said.
They explained the winnings were substantial because of a "pooling system" among at least ten people.
However, Kevin Knowles, Paradise Games' owner, defended his company saying it has no issues with paying customers once they win "fair and square."
The Bahamas does not have an official state-run lottery, but "web shops" are local businesses that enable residents to place wagers on United States lottery games. The official state lottery results are used to determine winners, and the web shops accept wagers and pay out winners. Genuine state lottery tickets are not purchased on behalf of customers.
Web shops typically refer to midday and evening drawings as "Early" and "Late" drawings, meaning the Iowa Midday Pick 3 drawing would be referred to as "Early Iowa".
Mr. Knowles admitted his gaming house was forced to remove Iowa and Indiana games from their offerings pending an investigation after the "lotteries teamed up and posted identical results unbeknownst" to the company.
Lottery Post confirmed that as of July 1, the Iowa Lottery began using the Daily 3 and Daily 4 draw results from the Indiana Lottery for its Pick 3 and Pick 4 games. This shift eliminated the computerized drawings Iowa conducted in-state for the games for the past three years. Prior to April 16, 2014, used the Illinois Lottery's Pick 3 and Pick 4 drawing results for the games.
According to Mr. Knowles, about $180,000 was being disputed through July 4.
He said officials at the Gaming Board were made aware of the issues and it was expected the matter would be resolved sometime Wednesday.
"We played in Early Iowa and after visiting the web shop yesterday (Monday) we were told to come back because the workers in the shop were changing shifts," one of the men said in an interview at The Tribune yesterday. "We waited around and still were not able to get our money. We were told to return this (Tuesday) morning.
"When we returned at around 7am, we tried until at least 12pm and still nothing. All we were told was that there were problems. But we want to know what the problem is. We have the receipt that shows the number and this ticket says that Paradise Games says they will honour this receipt. That's two days of work we already missed to get our money.
"The number came and on the United States' Lottery Post website the number is there, but it is no longer on Paradise Games' website and it's not on the print out of numbers that have already fallen.
"You know why? Because they don't want to pay us our money. They think it's too much money to be paying out."
However, Mr. Knowles vigorously disputed this assertion, saying his business would not have been successful if it didn't pay patrons the money they win.
He explained, "Two of the lotteries teamed up and then posted the same results unbeknownst to us. Iowa and Indiana showed the same results. We took them down pending the investigation.
"These guys are claiming they won $180,000 not $100, but it is $180,000 they are trying to get.
"One (ticket claims winnings) of $50,000 and two is $31,000 and then there were a bunch of other payouts. We are doing the investigation and we have alerted the Gaming Board, so they are aware of it.
"The matter will be concluded tomorrow."
Mr. Knowles added, "We wouldn't be operating if we didn't pay our customers. We don't want to try and keep anyone's funds away from them. That wouldn't be good for business at all. If we owe them we pay them.
"It's not the amount of the money (that is the issue). If they won it fair and square they would have been paid yesterday on the spot."
Officials at the Gaming Board said yesterday there was a process to be followed in issues such as this, adding multiple patrons complained about problems receiving payouts from Paradise Games.
One official said from a legal perspective, the Gaming Act provides a mechanism for patrons who are aggrieved by gaming house operators to seek redress through the board and this process commences through a written complaint.
Patrons must also produce proof to show they purchased a particular number.
Once this is done, an interview with the both operator and patron is carried out.
The Gaming Board then arrives at a preliminary determination, of which both the patron and operator is notified.
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Iowa's switch to using the Indiana Lottery drawing results was a big plus for lottery players because it eliminated the computerized drawings Iowa was conducting for the past three years for Pick 3 and Pick 4.
Iowa is now back to a Grade A in the State Lottery Report Card, with Hot Lotto being the only game offered in the state with computerized drawings. Congratulations Iowa!
Indiana converted its Daily 3 and Daily 4 games back to real lottery ball drawings a few years ago, and now with Iowa using those drawings we have two states that have rolled back the clock on computerized drawings.
I can only hope this is a trend that continues!
Yes they failed to pay customers which was they fault, changes were posted n iowa site from ending of june , the number house failed to keep check on the lottery sites therefore they didnt adjust they time now they dont want to pay!
Looking at the ticket it looks suspicious to me.
The chances of you getting straight hits for both Pick4 and Pick3 on the same day for the midday drawing would be rare but not impossible.
It would be interesting to know before Iowa switched back to using Indiana draws at what times the draws occurred. If Iowa was later than Indiana then they might have had time to place bets on Iowa's midday draw using the Indiana results if the web site did not know that Iowa was now using Indiana's results which seems to be the case based on the article
It seems like they were post betting the results from Indiana on Iowa draws to me. But you could always say it was the company's responsibility to know at what time the draws occurred so as to eliminate the possibility of post betting.
Jimmy
yes we notice two house were throwing same balls, however indiana posetd before iowa, on webshop site iowa house was still open at this time iowa was never posted only indiana. it is webshop fault they did not adjust the time for iowa far as they site had iowa closed at 1:35 inidiana was posted shortly after 1:20
Wouldn't it be smart for the Iowa lottery to close pools at the EXACT SAME TIME, and post draw results at the EXACT SAME TIME as Indiana to alleviate this sort of problem? I'm not saying this doesn't already happen, but if they are going to piggyback off of Indiana, shouldn't they at least synchronize when their pools close and when results get posted?
Let's assume for the sake of argument that Iowa closed their pools a bit later than Indiana. Most draws take place MINUTES after the pools close (In Michigan, it is 21 minutes, Ohio [correct me if I'm wrong, please] is less than 5 minutes). Let's also assume you have one person in Indiana who knows someone in Iowa. If the drawing takes place before the pools close in Iowa, you essentially have a guaranteed payout, since the person in Indiana can call the person in Iowa, and then you KNOW what is going to come out.
I remember a long time ago reading that they used the numbers from Illinois and thought that was a little weird. Most states only use another states' number if there is a severe problem with their draw equipment. Michigan has 3 states on backup, which are Ohio, Tennessee and, well, I can't remember the other one, but they are only used as a backup. Why can't Iowa hold their own draws (I know they did, but I don't look at computer draws as REAL draws) and pay based on those numbers instead of piggybacking off of another state?
On top of all that, did anyone from the Iowa Lottery tell the players that the way draws are being "conducted" was changing? Lots to sort through here... and too many unanswered questions as well.
Turns out I should have done my research before I posted, as most of my questions were already answered. However, I did find this little tidbit under "Game Rules" on the IA website:
The drawing will be held in accordance with the schedule posted to the Lottery's website (www.ialottery.com). The drawings will be held at the Multi-State Lottery (MUSL) location in Urbandale, Iowa under the supervision of a Drawing officer, an independent auditor and lottery security. All drawings are video recorded. All drawings of the Lottery are public events.
Those rules were last updated in April, 2014, according to the date in the upper right corner of the document. Since the drawings are now Indiana-based, I think it's time they updated their game rules to reflect this fact.
It's almost a month now and <snip> (Everybody win web shop still refused to pay customers in the Bahamas
I don't understand why Iowa using Indiana results are relevant. Why is there an investigation?
Wait a minute.
If the web shop didn't know Iowa was using Indiana results, is it possible they were allowing people to place bets for Iowa after Indiana had there mid draw results already?
Could that be the issue?