South Carolina Lottery in Trouble, After Printing 42 000 Winning Tickets
The South Carolina Lottery is in serious trouble after 42 000 winning lottery tickets were printed out on Christmas day 2017. The winning tickets were printed out for Holiday Cash Add-A-Play game over the course of two hours. The game is a tic-tac-toe style game, with players trying to find three Christmas trees in a row.
The South Carolina lottery is in hot water, after 42 000 winning tickets were printed for a Christmas-themed game in 2017.
South Carolina Lottery’s Difficult Path Forward
However, there was a massive glitch that meant that every ticket sold had Christmas trees in all nine squares on the ticket. The maximum number was supposed to be five. This made Christmas day extra special for many gamblers, but the South Carolina lottery wasn’t feeling the Christmas cheer. It now looks as though it may have to pay out over $33 million in winnings to players due to the glitch. The sad part is that this money had been set aside for the state to use for school buses and scholarships.
However, there’s a massive Catch 22 for the South Carolina Lottery. If it doesn’t pay out the winnings, it is very likely to face thousands of lawsuits from players who won. However, if they do pay out the winnings, they’ll likely be sued by advocate groups who have pointed out that they’re not supposed to payout misprinted tickets. No matter what they do, the path forward isn’t easy, and South Carolina schools will have to do without this extra money while the situation is resolved.
Troublemaking Cyber Santa?
The South Carolina Lottery Director, Hogan Brown, recently revealed in a hearing that the lottery had employed the services to Gaming Laboratories International. The New Jersey-based company would investigate the situation and establish whether the lottery’s Greek technology partner, Intralot, was liable in any way.
However, due to the timing of the glitch, there are those who are wondering if this was the work of outside forces, a Lottery Santa if you will. Some people don’t think that it is a coincidence that this happened on Christmas day. Time will tell what the investigation reveals and how the South Carolina lottery proceeds.