How To Win A Scratch Lottery Ticket
There's something sneaky I want to make sure you guys areaware of.
In the industry it's called 'pinning', and this scratch off scam can mean you missout on a big winner without ever knowing about it.
Massachusetts State Lottery Site. Mail a completed Claim Form along with the signed ticket to the address on the form. Certain prizes must be claimed in person at Lottery headquarters in Middletown. These include a Powerball® or Mega Millions® jackpot prize; an annuity top or second-level prize for Cash4Life®, or an annuity prize for a Scratch-Off game. Lottery Scratch Off Scams: How To Avoid Getting Caught Out. There's something sneaky I want to make sure you guys are aware of. In the industry it's called 'pinning', and this scratch off scam can mean you miss out on a big winner without ever knowing about it.
There's a weak point in the way scratch-off tickets are claimed.You have to scratch a panel to reveal a barcode. It's that barcodethat has to be scanned to tell if the ticket is a winner or not.
This is a different barcode to the one you can see before youstart scratching anything. It's hidden and has to be scratched tobe seen. For a good reason - because this is the security measureto stop a dodgy assistant or store owner from checking all thetickets and pulling out the winning ones!
Sounds good so far... except...
Well, some 'smart cookie' figured out you don't need to see muchof a barcode to be able to scan it!
STOP: Hold up. Make sure you get all of my lottery scratch off tips. They could be the difference between winning big and forever losing.
Barcodes are a series of vertical lines. But it's the thickness of thelines and the thickness of the spaces between them that 'decode'into a serial number. The only reason barcodes are as tall as theyare is to make them a big and easy target for scanner machines.
Here's what the dodgy assistants figure out.
If you take a ruler and a pin (hence the name 'pinning'), you canremove a thin line of the scratch material. Just enough so thatwith careful aim you can scan the ticket to see if it's a winner.While still leaving the ticket looking unused!
They then keep the winners (they just buy them - no rule againstthat bit). But then sell you the losers..!
YES - lottery scratch off scams are a criminal offence. And yes, the lottery companies are awareof it. Anyone caught doing this will end up in serious trouble.
But I want you to know about it so you don't caught out!
So there are 2 danger signs to be very aware of:-
- Never buy a 'loose' ticket that just appears from under thecounter. Watch the assistant detach your ticket fresh from theroll in front of you.
- Inspect each ticket you buy closely BEFORE you walk away.Make sure there is no damage at all to the scratch surface. Ifthere is, ask for a replacement ticket.
This is not the only lottery ticket scam out there. So I'd also recommend you always report anything suspicious thathappens when buying tickets or claiming winnings. Dishonestsellers are rare but they do exist.
TIP: Know how to figure out what are the best scratchers? All tickets are not the same. It is possible to figure out which are the best to play. Don't just buy randomly because that really hurts your chances.
Lottery companies take lottery scratch card scams VERY seriously. Phone them andreport the store to the security department. They will investigateand take major action if they find anything dodgy going on.
Read More Scratch Tips:
Secrets of State Lottery Scratch-off Contracts
When most people think of advantage gambling, state lottery scratch-offs are the last thing that enters their minds.
Everyone’s heard of counting cards at blackjack. There are even several moviesabout it.
And poker has been shown to be a game of skill; just look at the repeat winners of major tournaments like the World Series of Poker and the World Poker Tour.
But most people still refer to the lottery as an “idiot tax”.
And scratch offs have a notoriously bad expected value (which you can think of as a gambling game’s return on investment).
To give you an example of how bad lottery tickets can be, most $1 scratch offs have an expected value of around 60%, meaning for every $1 you spend, you’re expected to get back just $0.60; a $0.40 loss.
Most penny slots have paybacks that are better than that.
And other gambling games, like blackjack, can approach 99% payback without any card counting at all.
I’m here to shed light on a new way of thinking about scratch-offs and show you how you can improve your odds. It won’t always be profitable.
But under the right circumstances, it can be. If you’re going to play regardless, you might as well maximize your chances of winning.
Here are my insights about how to win at scratch-offs. I’ve gained these insights by reading the contracts and procurement documents that state lottery organizations have with their ticket printers.
Combine these insights with sites that calculate a scratch-off ticket’s odds, and you’ll be playing like a sharp
Where Are Scratch-off Grand Prizes?
Grand prizes are not random.
I’m sure all of these insights will come as a surprise.
But this one is probably the biggest.
Surely the state wants to ensure a fair game.
How can it be fair if the biggest prizes of all aren’t even random?
Here’s an image of the procurement document that the Massachusett’s lottery used to elicit bids from ticket printers:
How To Win Scratch Lotto
You’ll see that they require the grand prizes to be distributed evenly throughout the game.
Note that “distributed evenly throughout the game” is not random.
If the prizes were random, then they might all appear at the start of the game. Or they might all appear at the end of a game.
But the state doesn’t want that to happen. If all of the grand prizes were claimed at the start of the game, then people would stop playing the game because they would have no shot at the big money.
You can take advantage of this fact by figuring out how many tickets are in a “pool” where a grand prize should be. If there are 9,000,000 tickets and 3 grand prizes, then divide 9,000,000 by 3 to figure out that there must be 1 grand prize every 3,000,000 tickets.
How To Pick Winning Scratch Off Tickets
Then, use the state’s lottery website to figure out how many tickets remain. Most states publish this information for each game.
In the example game just mentioned, if there were 7,000,000 tickets remaining and still 3 remaining grand prizes, then you know the first grand prize must be in the next 1,000,000 tickets. Your odds just improved from 1 in 3,000,000 to 1 in 1,000,000.
That may not seem like much, but it can mean the difference between negative and positive expected value.
Is There A Limit To The Number Of Big Winning Tickets In A Roll?
Here’s an image from documents filed as part of a Texas lawsuit against the state and the ticket printer:
In this contract that Texas has with IGT, there’s a clause that states that there can be no more than a certain number of $25-$50 winners per pack of tickets. There’s another clause that states there can be no more than one winner of $75 and higher per pack. (The “one” is redacted, but we can deduce that tit’s one by looking at the word following the redaction, which is “winner” rather than “winners”).
How can you use this to your advantage?
Buy only one ticket from a pack at a time and scratch it right there at the store.
If it happens to be a big winner, don’t buy any more tickets from that pack.
What Is The Minimum Payback for a Roll of Scratch-off Tickets?
This next image is from the request for a proposal from the New Mexico lottery association to ticket printers:
How To Win Scratch Off Tickets Reddit
It shows that each pack of tickets has some guaranteed payout. The details of the guaranteed payout aren’t specified, but from other contracts and personal experience, I’ve found it to typically be about 50% of the price of a pack of tickets. If an entire roll of tickets costs $600, then the GLEP is usually about $300.
What this means for the advantage player is that you should not stop buying after a string of losers.
How To Win A Lottery Ticket Scratch
Since each roll of tickets is guaranteed to have a certain minimum payout, then every loser you see increases the chance that the remaining tickets are winners.
Conclusion
While none of the above insights will guarantee you will win, they are just a few of the things you can do for yourself if you want to know how to beat scratch-offs.
Combine these insights with some expected value calculations from the remaining prizes that get displayed on the state lottery websites and you’ll be doing way better than the average lotto player.
Good luck.
About the Author
How To Win Scratch Lottery
Eric Ihli, a professional gambler/programmer, spent 10 years as a full-time professional gambler and 5 years as a software engineer. He now combines those two passions by writing software to discover and evaluate profitable gambling opportunities.