Lottery throws all blame on a contractor; players bear the brunt
By Todd Northrop
A month ago, Tennessee Lottery officials claimed the state's new computerized drawings would be "exciting".
What Tennessee lottery players got instead were buggy, unfair drawings, in which almost half the numbers people picked had no chance whatsoever of winning.
The severely flawed drawings have been happening every day since computerized drawings replaced the lottery's real mechanical ball drawings more than three weeks ago.
That's a total of 80 Pick 3 and Pick 4 drawings in which almost half the lottery ticket players bought were unwinnable.
The flaw in the drawings prevented two of the same numbers from appearing together, in what players refer to as "doubles" and "triples", and in Pick 4, "quads".
The lottery is offering refunds to players with tickets with doubles, triples, or quads, but if you threw out your losing ticket, then you've lost twice. Only players producing qualifying tickets will get a refund.
In a press release issued today, the Tennessee Lottery blamed a "programming issue" for the bad drawings.
The programming issue , which impacted the last three weeks of Cash 3 and Cash 4 drawings, was discovered yesterday, and was attributed to human error made by an outside, third party vendor.
The lottery did not state if they bothered to run any pretests, which in the lottery industry are designed to catch flaws before they impact players. Instead, the only blame cast by the lottery was on the unnamed outside vendor.
In a statement released today, the lottery's CEO expressed "regrets" for the error, and then attempted to shift attention to education, even though it is unrelated to computerized drawings.
"Once the issue was pinpointed, it was corrected immediately," said Rebecca Hargrove, President and CEO of the Tennessee Lottery. "The Tennessee Lottery sincerely regrets what happened and wants to reassure our players and everyone in Tennessee that the drawings have been rectified and we will continue to move forward with our mission to maximize dollars for education."
For those who selected two or more of the same numbers in a play for Cash 3 or Cash 4 during the past 23 days (July 28 through Aug. 20) and who still have their tickets, the Lottery is offering a double refund for the price of each affected play or two free plays equal to the value of the affected plays.
For those who play Cash 3 or Cash 4 for the next 23 days, from Aug. 22 until Sept. 13, the Lottery will offer additional cash prizes. Players can win up to $599 in Cash 3 and up to $6,000 in Cash 4.
The lottery announced they would try to fix any problems caused by the outside consultant by hiring another consultant.
"Although we are confident with the application adjustment made yesterday by our third party vendor, we are seeking an outside consultant to review the entire process."
The lottery did not state if they were considering a switch back to real mechanical ball drawings.
I hear the sound of the first shoe dropping!
Mark my words, the Tennessee Lottery will not learn anything from this. Remember when the same number came up three times in a row in the Kansas Pick 3, a billion to one occurance, or when Daily Derby in CA had it's own flaw. They didn't learn anything because they are still drawn with the same flawed technology. I can't see any reason the situation here in Tennessee will be any different.
I hope I'm wrong about this, but I probably will be right.
When I was a kid, my calculator could do better random numbers. Seed cosine based on time to nanosecond of drawing individual balls. I still like the balls. Keep them honest. Must be a money thing for the lottery officials. If I was a programmer, I would put in a backdoor or a bomb. Win me a lottery the old fashioned way, steal it.
I am so glad I still have my tickets. a 2 fer isn't bad. I am going to enjoy this..(I think). The draws should be mostly doubles coming up.
Sadly, I agree. There is a Forest Gump saying that comes to mind.
"The lottery announced they would try to fix any problems caused by the outside consultant by hiring another consultant".
Why are we not surprised by this ?
This is exactly what we all feared when Tenn went to this system and lo and behold it happened.
The best way to fix this is to stop playing. See if that get's Rebeccas attention.
OOO, oooo; stupid is as stupid does.
Ping pong balls are much nicer.
I agree, but I don't think it was even their RNG. It was just an incredibly BAD programming error, which should have EASILY been caught. Obviously, the Tennessee Lottery did NOT do any semblance of due diligence on the new draw system, or it would have been caught, as the article states.
I'll bet that the RNG did not spit out any doubles or triples because it was setup exactly like the Pick 5 game, in which it is not allowed to draw duplicates. So all they did is change the possible numbers that could be drawn, and did not alter the rules to allow duplicates.
This is absolutely horrendous. The CEO is directly responsible for this, as that's where the buck stops. Yet she tries to cast the blame on a contractor, rather than admitting that the lottery did not do the proper due diligence.
I am outraged, and I don't even live there. I can't imagine what you Tennesseeans must feel like. You have all been repeatedly slapped in the face, while the lottery tries to convince you that someone else is at fault.
I Don't Like It Either! I like to witness the drawing in real time; mechanical, not computerized. Computerized drawings..... anything can happen. When you got a huge Jackpot up for grabs, people are going to be P/O! They're NOT going to be happy campers!
To say the least
Here in Michigan, the 3 digit game, and 4 digit game are still mechanical. But the Keno, Fantasy 5, and Classic Lotto 47.... I'm not so sure.
Everytime I looked at the drawings on tv @ 7:29pm here in MI, and after the 3 & 4 digit games were drawn all the person says is " And the rest of the winning numbers are NOW, on your screen". And then they show the numbers. That's It!! Good Nite! and Good Luck!
They don't show how they were drawn (like they use to, years ago, with other lotto games by the mechanical rotating balls dropping into the different slots of the machine.
A progammer can do anything. And when you have a team, look out!
I've said it before, stop buying lottery tickets and see how quick they have a change of heart about computerized drawings. Thats the government spirit, spend more money to an outside consultant...>>>>>>?? I really feel sorry for the people of Tenn...!
To the Tennessee Lottery:
Prove to me beyond the shadow of the doubt that you didn't do this on purpose and only regret getting caught. Any references to education will discredit your argument in full.
I'd wait to hear your response but I have better things to do with my time than listen to your silence.
Wow....that is all I can say....wow
Brad
One of the stories,that I had read on this site about another state changing earlier this year, claimed cost effectiveness of the computer system over the ping pong ball method. I guess if they can eliminate another job and replace it with computers that don't need food, clothing or medical insurance, then the computer IS cost effective--until using a computer draw becomes a liability (i.e.--till TN citizens stop playing the P3 and P4 games)
PS Jeffrey--Steal one for me while you're at it.