See the warning the N.Y. lottery issued

msnbc ^ | 5/3/09

[lowbridge]

See the warning the N.Y. lottery issued

These were dispensed during Dateline's probe into shady clerk practice

[lowbridge]

Background: Dateline did a report tonight on dishonest lottery retailers in many states who were robbing winning lottery tickets and/or buying them from actual winners. New York refused to cooperate with NBC and warned its retailers against the undercover investigation.

[TruthHound]

I don’t get it. What’s the scam? Don’t watch NBC news programs.

[lowbridge]

What’s the scam?

Many times people walk into a lottery retailer with a winning ticket, and asks the clerk to check it for them to see if its a winner. The clerk tells them no, its not a winner, keeps the ticket, and cashes it in himself.

OR the winner of a ticket may owe money in back taxes, court fees, child support, whatever and if he cashes in his winning ticket, it will be taken out of his winnings. So the clerk offers to buy it off him (650 for a 1000 dollar winner for example) for cash, and the clerk earns himself a 350 profit.

States have been noticing that lottery retailers have been turning in winning tickets quite often, which triggered this investigation.

[goingpostal]

I live in upstate NY and if I have any lottery tickets, I go to one of the convenience stores that has the auto-checker machine installed on its premises. That way you can find out if you won, and exactly how much you won. My husband had a $2500 winning scratch-off ticket 4 years ago, and asked a clerk at the store to verify it. She said it wasn’t a winner and asked if my hubby wanted her to dispose of it.
I imagine that’s what this story is about. I don’t watch NBC and especially not MSNBC and refuse to visit their website. (I’m afraid of a tingle going up my leg...LOL!)

[spectre]

I go to one of the convenience stores that has the auto-checker machine installed on its premises.

Bingo! If they had a law that the clerk could NOT check for winners or even handle the ticket, so that the customer had to use one of those machines instead, that problem would be solved.

sw

[Mannaggia l'America]

Interesting story (even though I do not play the lottery).

But how lazy must one be to sink money into the lottery, then not even check your own tickets to see if you won?

OK, I could see if you had 100 Lotto tickets where you had to check a bunch of numbers, but if there were millions at stake, wouldn't you want to take a few minutes to check them?

And there's not much excuse for not checking the scratch offs - you spend the time to scratch them, but not check if you won?

They ought to just replace the tickets with slot machines then - instant gratification.

[SaraJohnson]

New and improved humanistic bankster ethics.

[Mannaggia l'America]

That way you can find out if you won, and exactly how much you won.

In the PMSNBC story, NY would not cooperate with their investigation, but California did. According to the story, apparently in California the checker machines tell you if you won, but not how much. So you have to ask the clerk. Big hole in the system.

In one case, the clerk switched a $1000 winning ticket with a $4 winner.

[Charlespg]

North Carolina and Va have to give them back

[Valpal1]

Looks like some people pay the stupid tax twice.