The best of the new year to all who visit this blog. I had an update ready for Christmas but decided not to post in honour of the season. My family each received a Bonus Cash For Life ticket in their respective stockings from Santa. There were two known winners totaling $12 and four unknown results. If anyone leaves town shortly I'll know why.
Thirteen Grand Prizes were claimed over the past two weeks including two from the brand spanking new Bejeweled game. Alas, none was claimed from Bonus Cash For Life #1168. The game presently has three of its five $675,000 Grand Prizes left to be claimed and only 19% of its float left to sell. The odds to win one are now only 640,000:1 which is as low as I have ever seen for a Cash For Life game. $.264 of every dollar spent on the game will go to those three lucky winners.
The problem, for me, is that I am fed up with the game. And I'm not alone - several posters have also reported poor results. I'm going to take a week off from the game just to sooth my injured resolve.
New on the scene is a $2 Blackjack, $5 Hit the Jackpot, and a $10 Bejeweled game. Please see the comments to the previous blog post for detailed descriptions of the games. It is noteworthy that Bejeweled has already lost 2 of its 6 Grand Prizes. That's enough to throw me off. The Blackjack game scores well on the rating formula. The Hit The Jackpot is a new brand of game. Comments are encouraged from any players who give it a try.
I extended play in the last fortnight purchasing two Holiday Gift packs, two Holiday Spectaculars and four Bonus Cash For Lifes. My total return was $20 and that was scored on the first ticket I scratched. I ended the year with a cash rate of 30% and a return on investment of 58%. This is the worst result for the three years that I have been playing. In 2013 I cashed at a rate of 37% with a Return on Investment of 72%. In 2012 I cashed at 38% with a return of 63%.
There were four games during the year for which I purchased more than 10 tickets. Of those, More Lucky Lines was the kindest yielding 37% winners and a return of 76%. The worst was our current top rated game, Bonus Cash For Life, that included 24% winners and a return of 49%.
In the end, my biggest problem in 2014 was that I enjoyed no cashes for more than $20. You have to hit a $50 or $100 winner if you want to boost the results. Of course, a nice little 4 figure win like Shelley enjoyed would be deeply appreciated.
Still, It's a new year and all the numbers are re-set to zero. Let's get out of the box like a lithe greyhound chasing "Sparky".
I appreciate the growth in our little community over the past year. The current posting of this blog receives over 100 visits per day. The more folks who post add to the dialogue and I very much enjoy reading what people have to say. I also like that people post pictures of their $50 and up winning tickets. There is something very encouraging when I see that winning is possible. CL66 posted a $50 winner in $2 Cash For Life this past week. Now that's impressive!
My thanks to all. May 2015 be good to each and every one of us.
Next week I'll be taking a look at the new OLG on line platform.
Doug
Thirteen Grand Prizes were claimed over the past two weeks including two from the brand spanking new Bejeweled game. Alas, none was claimed from Bonus Cash For Life #1168. The game presently has three of its five $675,000 Grand Prizes left to be claimed and only 19% of its float left to sell. The odds to win one are now only 640,000:1 which is as low as I have ever seen for a Cash For Life game. $.264 of every dollar spent on the game will go to those three lucky winners.
The problem, for me, is that I am fed up with the game. And I'm not alone - several posters have also reported poor results. I'm going to take a week off from the game just to sooth my injured resolve.
Top Rated Games
- $4 Bonus Cash for Life #1168 - Clear top choice
- $10 Christmas Spectacular #1816 - 1 Grand Prize left and only 140,000 tickets
- $10 Fortune #1779 - Nine $1 Million dollar prizes left - Inter-provincial game
- $4 Cash For Life #1161 - main secondary prizes gutted - pass
- $2 Holiday Cashout #1812 - 40% of float sold and all 3 Grand Prizes are left
Games to Avoid
- $5 Cash In #1807 - All Grand and Second Prizes claimed
- $3 Crossword #3206 - All Grand and Second Prizes claimed - less than 10% of float remains
- $3 More Lucky Lines #1794 - the unethical sale of these dogs continues
- $1 Lucky Lines #1770 - stunk since its debut
- $3 Keno #1415 - 2 of 5 Grand Prizes gone in first 20% of tickets sold
$1 - $2 Game Update
Holiday Cashout is a very good choice in this group.$3 Game Update
Scrabble #1821 is the best of a scraggy lot of games.$4 - $5 Game Update
Bonus Cash For Life is much the best$10 - $20 Game Update
Lots of Grand Prizes lost over Christmas. Go with Holiday Spectacular if you can find any.Comings and Goings
Wild 10's and Horseshoes were both retired over the holidays. Each of the games had 15-20 % of their float remaining and were well rated games. I would like to have seen each stay in play longer and some of the games mentioned in the "Games To Avoid" section retired instead.New on the scene is a $2 Blackjack, $5 Hit the Jackpot, and a $10 Bejeweled game. Please see the comments to the previous blog post for detailed descriptions of the games. It is noteworthy that Bejeweled has already lost 2 of its 6 Grand Prizes. That's enough to throw me off. The Blackjack game scores well on the rating formula. The Hit The Jackpot is a new brand of game. Comments are encouraged from any players who give it a try.
Personal Play
I extended play in the last fortnight purchasing two Holiday Gift packs, two Holiday Spectaculars and four Bonus Cash For Lifes. My total return was $20 and that was scored on the first ticket I scratched. I ended the year with a cash rate of 30% and a return on investment of 58%. This is the worst result for the three years that I have been playing. In 2013 I cashed at a rate of 37% with a Return on Investment of 72%. In 2012 I cashed at 38% with a return of 63%.
There were four games during the year for which I purchased more than 10 tickets. Of those, More Lucky Lines was the kindest yielding 37% winners and a return of 76%. The worst was our current top rated game, Bonus Cash For Life, that included 24% winners and a return of 49%.
In the end, my biggest problem in 2014 was that I enjoyed no cashes for more than $20. You have to hit a $50 or $100 winner if you want to boost the results. Of course, a nice little 4 figure win like Shelley enjoyed would be deeply appreciated.
Still, It's a new year and all the numbers are re-set to zero. Let's get out of the box like a lithe greyhound chasing "Sparky".
In Conclusion
I appreciate the growth in our little community over the past year. The current posting of this blog receives over 100 visits per day. The more folks who post add to the dialogue and I very much enjoy reading what people have to say. I also like that people post pictures of their $50 and up winning tickets. There is something very encouraging when I see that winning is possible. CL66 posted a $50 winner in $2 Cash For Life this past week. Now that's impressive!
My thanks to all. May 2015 be good to each and every one of us.
Next week I'll be taking a look at the new OLG on line platform.
Doug
My wife & I won $30 on a couple of $5 tickets. We decided to roll it into a $20 Extra for her and a $10 Caddy for me which was a dud. I don't know why I keep buying the Caddy's since I've only won once on them out of about 10 tries ($50). Some would say that's not too bad but I say it's not too good.
ReplyDeleteMy wife won $50 on the Extra. Anyway, the amazing part is that my wife has only ever played Extra 5 times and has never lost on them. I've never played one myself.
20 + 40 + 60 + 50 + 50 = 220 for $100 invested.
Of course now that I've said that we'll probably never see another winner.
I played some $20's last weekend and crapped out..also a bunch of cadillac last couple weeks with only 2 winners at $10 each..I'm done with the $20 games. .lol..it hurts to much when you hit a bunch of duds..gl to you Lloyd
DeleteI know how ya feel Darth. I once went thru 23 Crosswords and finally won $3 on the 24th ticket. I can't imagine myself ever doing that with 10 or 20 dollar tickets.
DeleteLloyd,
DeleteI recall working out your bad luck as being 1000-1 shot. That makes you the anti-matter to Shelley's matter, or something like that.
Doug
Yeah Doug, it sometimes feels like an anti-mater universe in our little hobby. If my anti-matter boosted Shelley's matter, then my job here is done. All kidding aside tho, I'm glad Shelley won her prize but I was really hoping someone here would pull off a real major win. Oh well, there's always 2015.
DeleteNew cash for life game incoming, Double cash for life. Saw an ad at one of the kiosks. Grand prize is 2000 a week for life, I believe it's still $4 per ticket.
ReplyDeleteDouble cash for life..sounds interesting. .I posted last week that it's coming early January sometime but wasn't aware it was double..wonder if that means 1. 3m ..lol..tlk about top heavy...wonder how the numbers will look like on this one..
Deleteis cash for life 1161 still sold? I travel a lot for work and never see these tickets anywhere?
Deletecfl, i find it hard to believe the 60% chance of winning. The last 10-15 tickets i bought didnt win me anything.
ReplyDelete-save your money and invest in oil this yr.
There will be around 10 Million tickets issued for the new D-CFL. Your 10-15 ticket sample size will produce tremendous variation in the results.
DeleteAs such, I prefer to look at the Most Likely Scenario (MLS). I base this on how many tickets I am most likely to buy over the life of the game. In this particular case and based on my habits, it will be less than 150 tickets.
Looking at the D-CFL info sheet, the odds of winning a $4 prize is 1-in-10.16 (0.09843 or 9.843%), a $6 prize is 1-in-16.67 (0.06000), an $8 prize is 1-in-44.73 (0.02236), a $10 prize is 1-in-140 (0.00714) and a $12 prize is 1-in-12.478 (0.08014).
Summing up the percentages, I get a hit rate of 1-in-3.73 or 0.26807. This makes sense. Basically, all the other prizes, because there are so few of them, will only lower the hit rate to the published 1-in-3.70.
My expected return (based on 100 tickets) is $196.568 / $400 or 49.142%. This is what I will most likely experience. The prize payout of 69.63% is skewed by the few large top prizes. You'll get this result if you buy all the tickets and win all the prizes.
Basically, you have to be extremely lucky to come out on top with scratch games. What's more, you shouldn't expect to win a 1-in-50000 prize unless you're buying 50000 tickets the exception being you were very lucky.
Good luck to all.
Interesting read Tommy. .I like your point of view...
DeleteThanks Darth.
DeleteThe type of approach also helps explain somewhat the popularity of the $3 games which provide a lot of play time, namely, Crossword and Bingo. Firstly, the games themselves take more time to play. Secondly, they tend to have small prize payouts of between 53% and 57% (usually). As you've noticed, small prizes can be "recycled" back into more tickets or play time. Typically 100 of these $3 games should theoretically win enough to allow for 210 plus games to be played for that initial $300.
The ONLY way to increase one's odds of winning the top prize is to play more. Unfortunately, that's also the way to losing more. However, one can lessen this effect by playing more on the house's dime by recycling small prize payouts. Hence, my focus on small prize payouts.
Very succinct Tommy. I am more naive and work out my chances to win up to $100 as realistic. CL66 has a chart with the chances to win 2x - 5x the cost of the ticket. I agree that winning small prizes is important but we can't entirely ignore the Grand Prize when we look at game choices. What weight do you attribute to that factor?
DeleteI believe we're all looking at the same puzzle but just with different assumptions. Doug, I noticed you also consider the price of the ticket and the potential top prize in your ranking. This is good especially for the casual player or those with limited budgets, say, $10-$20 per week. Less appropriate for the more aggressive players like Darth.
DeleteThere's nothing wrong with using $100 or 2x-5x as "realistic". It all depends on how many games you normally play. If the odds of winning $100 are 1-in-3000 but you figure you'll only be playing 100 games, it will be less likely you'll encounter that $100 win. Thus, I prefer to look at the odds first as opposed to the prize first.
For all intensive purposes, I assign a value of zero (0) to winning the top prize. Typical popular $3 games will have 10 top prizes and a 1-in-2,000,000 odds initially. Choose a number between 1 and 2,000,000. Got it? What is it? Wrong. O.k., joking aside, it is extremely difficult to win the top prize. Even 1-in-50,000 is difficult to win. You have to be very, very lucky OR you have to play more. The only way to play more without paying more is via the greater amount of small prizes and hope luck smiles on you (ie. large prize) as you churn through the games.
What's more, scratch games have a "geographic" disadvantage versus draw games, ie., the winning ticket(s) may not even be in your town/city/neighborhood. Unless there is a chance that ALL (or NONE) of the top prizes are accessible to you, the calculated odds of winning based on tickets already sold/reduced float may be completely inaccurate. Yes, theoretically, if half the tickets are estimated sold and none of the top prizes are claimed your odds winning have doubled from the initial issue. But they could also be ZERO. A forced 'random' distribution of top prizes is not random. To be truly random, there must be the possibility that you could have bought any or all of the remaining unclaimed top prizes.
Life is 99.9999% luck. The other HALF is a good grasp of mathematics.
8-))
The new $4 Double Cash For Life + $3 Cashingo are out - i will post a full review of each at a later time - with D-CFL, there has been a major prize structure change, compared to B-CFL, that most of you wouldnt notice until after you started buying them - there is a 94% drop in prizes over $12 - it's mostly due to the $20 prize being slashed from 286,636 down to only 1,000 - they have essentially passed this to the doubling of the number of $6, $8 and $10 prizes - the odds to win more than $12 used to be 1 in 33, now it's 1 in 525! (0_o)
ReplyDeleteCongrats on your nice $2cfl prize..nice find for a $2 game...
Deletethis new double cfl game is going to have crazy odds... 2. 5 million to one for a
grand prize. .but if you can
even hit a 50% return your
ticket cost is reduced to only
$2 a ticket..lol..I can't think
of a game that olg offers a
greater than a million dollar prize for only $2..
I'll be a buyer of this game in moderation, and I'll keep a close eye on the float verses grand prize odds..but I like the bonus cfl better..
GL buddy and try not to bash this one too badly..lol..a $1.35 m grand prize should have some value for a lower priced ticket.
how do you know how many tickets were sold ?
ReplyDeleteIt was my favorite word a couple months ago..."EXTRAPOLATION"..
Delete..for example if there is 500 remaining prizes out of a thousand they are 50% gone ..so if there is a 3 million ticket float we assume with reasonable accuracy the float is also 50% gone and there would be 1.5 m tickets left..
There is a small margin of error but it's quite accurate..
if you go back through old posts theres plenty of other examples and explanations..
GL
I should properly include a disclaimer of +/- the calculated percentage, 19 times in 20. Given the large float sizes, this always comes down to the number of top prizes listed on the Outstanding Prize web site. At present, there is a range os +/- 1% up to +/- 7% for the games with few top prizes listed. I used to include that information in the updates but I received feedback that it was boring to read it all the time.
Deletethanks for explaining
DeleteHeres my scratch off results for the last couple weeks for anyone's interest:
ReplyDelete4 free $2cfl -win $4
2 $2 holiday cash out - duds
5 double cfl - win $18
14 bonus cfl -win $30
2 20xlucky - duds
2 hit jackpot - win $25
6 crossword tripler - win $50
4 holiday gp's - win $75
5 fortune -win $30
10 cadillac- win $20
7 $20 extrodinaire -duds
Total spent $464
Total won__$252
Total lost___$212
For a 54%return. .not great..I'm finished with the $20 tickets , my return was decent if I didn't play them..
played 5 of the new $4 double cfl this morning ..spend $20 win $18 on two of the tickets..decent start.
GL everyone
2 $2cfl were duds..and were missing on the list.
DeleteI hit a $100 on the gift pack, bought 10 more and one was win 6 times for $150!
DeleteWow that's soooo exciting!!!
DeleteThe last 4 I got yielded nothing...so thanks for the inspiration. ;)
Did well today. Bought 3 Holiday Spectacular and 1 Cadillac. 2 Spectaculars won $25 and the Caddy won me $100. Nice $85 profit.
ReplyDeleteNice score!
DeleteI had 2 Caddys and 6 CFL 1168's which netted me a grand total of $8. I need to get a result a bit closer to yours lol
$4 Double Cash For Life - Review
ReplyDeleteGrand prize: 4 x $2,000 Week/Cash For Life
Next top prizes: 1 x $50,000 - 1 x $10,000 - 1 x $5,000
Number of tickets: 9,996,000
All available prizes and odds to win:
$4 or more (any prize) - 1 in 3.70
$6 or more - 1 in 5.83
$8 or more - 1 in 8.96
$10 or more - 1 in 11.21
$12 or more - 1 in 12.19
$14 or more - 1 in 525
$16 or more - 1 in 1,200
$20 or more - 1 in 1,254
$22 or more - 1 in 1,434
$30 or more - 1 in 1,826
$50 or more - 1 in 2,100
$60 or more - 1 in 5,250
$70 or more - 1 in 6,462
$100 or more - 1 in 8,933
$120 or more - 1 in 18,241
$500 or more - 1 in 52,335
$560 or more - 1 in 54,032
$1,000 or more - 1 in 87,684
$1,500 or more - 1 in 88,460
$5,000 or more - 1 in 1,428,000
$10,000 or more - 1 in 1,666,000
$50,000 or more - 1 in 1,999,200
$2,000 Week/Cash For Life- 1 in 2,499,000
Out of all 29 games:
Ranks 19th on winning $50,000+
Ranks 26th on winning $5,000+
Ranks 13th on winning $1,000+
Ranks 18th on winning $250+
Ranks 24th on winning $50+
Ranks 26th on winning 2x-5x your $ or better
Ranks 24th on winning a ticket price back
Ranks 15th on winning any prize
The good news: 4 Double Cash For Life prizes for only $4. The bad news: just about everything else! The odds to win 1 of these grand prizes is 1 in 2.5 milion. There's a better chance the Leafs would rehire Randy Carlyle than i have at winning Double Cash For Life - lol. To make these grand prizes possible, almost every prize above $12 has been drasticly reduced in quantity, in comparison to Bonus Cash For Life. The odds to win more than $12 with B-CFL were 1 in 33, with D-CFL it's 1 in 525! While the number of small prizes of $6-$8-$10 have been doubled, this game still ranks as the 4th worst game to win 2x-5x your $ on. The odds to win any prize has improved slightly to 1 in 3.70. The grand prize is extremely attractive, but, to make this game so "top heavy", it's almost made the rest of this game meaningless as 99.3% of all prizes are now $4-$12. I rate this game 29/100, making it 25th out of all 29 games and the worst of all the cash-for-life games. I will still play this game once in awhile, tho only 1 ticket at a time. I would not recommend others do much more than that.
I have been following this blog for a while now and I appreciate all of your inputs! Very fun reading them! :)
ReplyDeleteJust wanna share the result of a roll of Jolly Holly I got a few weeks ago....
$210 for a roll.. and only $95 return....
To be honest I expected a higher return than $95...!
Got another roll of cashingo... will see how this roll go!
Has any one of you gotten a roll of ticket before? How did it go? :)
I was a buyer of entire packs of the older 1776 lucky lines back in the summer ..if you check old posts my results are way back there somewhere..I can say your return wasn't really great but you will experience variances and cannot expect a 60% return every pack..I agree with cl66 and avoid that game in volume unless the float gets drastically reduced with all large prizes remaining. .be very selective in the games you buy entire packs of ...I never lost my shirt nor did I win anything major..but I played an awful lot of $3 tickets for a nicely reduced cost of approx $1.20 a ticket. ..unless you get very lucky it's a losing proposition but my opinion is it's a strategy of reducing your ticket cost by rolling all your little prizes into another pack..GL..
DeleteOh, one more thing play with in your limit..and pack buying has been an unpopular topic in the past..but play your own style...I'd pack buy again but only on very selective games....cl66's 2x5x chart is a good start because you should have a game rich in little prizes and good float to grandprize ratio. ..
DeleteLet's look at Holly Jolly Tripler (HJT). A $3 game costing $210 per roll or 70 tickets.
ReplyDeleteExamining the odds for 1-in-70 or less on the info sheet: Odds of a $3 win is 1-in-8.68 or 0.11521 (ie. 11.521%), a $5 win is 1-in-29.11 or 0.03435, a $6 win is 1-in-35.90 or 0.02786, an $8 win is 1-in-60.87 or 0.01643, a $9 win is 1-in-28 or 0.03571 and a $10 win is 1-in-60.87 or 0.01643.
Totally the percentages is 0.24599 or a hit rate of 1-in-4.07. The expected value per 100 tickets (I use 100 tickets to compare across games) is $130.167 / $300 or 43.389%. Your result of $95 / $210 or 45.238% was not too far off the expected small prize payout actually.
I went to buy a holiday spectacular on Monday from a retailer I knew still had them. When I went in there were none visible, she told me they were all pulled that morning because all have prizes were claimed.. And it is now fake advertising. Which is true I guess, but there ate a lot more other purists to be won..
ReplyDeletePrizes*
Delete$3 Cashingo - Review
ReplyDeleteGrand prize: 4 x $75,000
Next top prize: 4 x $25,000
Number of tickets: 3,141,600
All available prizes and odds to win:
$3 or more (any prize) - 1 in 3.24
$5 or more - 1 in 5.65
$6 or more - 1 in 7.96
$9 or more - 1 in 21
$11 or more - 1 in 33
$14 or more - 1 in 79
$20 or more - 1 in 92
$25 or more - 1 in 272
$50 or more - 1 in 847
$75 or more - 1 in 2,143
$500 or more - 1 in 9,133
$508 or more - 1 in 26,180
$25,000 or more - 1 in 392,700
$75,000 - 1 in 785,400
Out of all 29 games:
Ranks 12th on winning $50,000+
Ranks 11th on winning $5,000+
Ranks 24th on winning $1,000+
Ranks 8th on winning $250+
Ranks 16th on winning $50+
Ranks 28th on winning 2x-5x your $ or better
Ranks 4th on winning a ticket price back
Ranks 3rd on winning any prize
The good news: #3 at winning any prize. The bad news: only 8 prizes worth more than $508 within 3.14 million tickets while being the 2nd worst game on rating to win 2x-5x on your $. It's good on odds to win $3/$5/$6, but odds are 1 in 21 to win more than $6. To win more than $25 comes at odds of 1 in 847. All other prizes/odds are average. I find this game to lack appeal so i won't bother to play it at all. I rate this game 52/100 making it 12th out of all 29 games.
I never really answered Doug's question as to how I incorporate top prize information into game selection. For the most part, I don't. Given the odds, even with float reduction, luck plays a greater part than math and the games usually get pulled before the math will play a significant part.
ReplyDeleteObviously or not, do not play games with no top prizes. Given the OLG's penchant for continuing to sell games with no top prizes, this cannot be underemphasized.
Know your budget, do not fudge it! Only bet what you are willing to lose. Scratch games are not a way to consistently make money. As entertainment, fine. But keep in mind the only way to win the top prize is to play more but given the odds you will probably lose your budget before attaining your goal.
Determine if play time is important. Certain games like Bingo or Crossword take more time to play. A $20 weekly budget on a $20 game won't last too long but will provide a game a day play with a $3 game.
Personally I avoid games like Bingo or Crossword. I have neither the patience nor the dexterity to enjoy them. I also dislike games where the outcome is known before the scratching is done. Games like Sapphire 7's or Cash In where scratching two unlike symbols on a line can already 'spoil the surprise'. Or 20X Lucky where the wins are either 0, 1 or 20. If you scratch two spots and one's a winner, there's no need to continue scratching. They did try to remedy this with Winner Take All but there were still some flaws with that game as well.
As such, I prefer games like CFL and the now defunct OIM (Ontario Instant Millions). Big scratch areas, medium play time, all areas have to be scratched to determine whether a winner or not. My advice is to basically play the game you like to play. And this is even before looking at the small prize payout information.
You will notice that at some points during 2014 that while some games with top prizes and smallish floats were recommended, large float games like Crossword were chugging along giving up a top prize every now and then. The better and fairer distribution of the top prizes meant that despite the 1-in-2M odds, the game was played and playable right down to the last top prize. Something to ponder.
Life is 99.9999% luck. The other HALF is a good grasp of mathematics.
I would add that one other way to choose your game is to goalseek the prize you desire. Basically seek the minimum prize that is "acceptable" to you and use the rankings provided by CL66 to choose your game. Thanks CL66 for your hard work in this area!
DeleteThanks for your perspective, Tommy! I especially appreciate your emphasis on "playing the games you like to play". As a person who has loved puzzles and games my whole life, I see this ticket scratching thing as another way to add the element of play and surprise into my life, versus it being an "investment plan"! ;) I'm curious about your particular buying strategy- do you buy one ticket at a time, randomly from different sources, or do you but several at once...or what? :)
DeleteI have no buying strategy. I tend to frequent the same 2-3 places in my neighborhood. If I'm on a losing streak I would occasionally try my luck elsewhere. Sometimes I will buy one or two at a time, sometimes my weekly limit. Sometimes I will buy ticket #1 from the bottom of the display, sometimes #2 or #7. I will try not to buy 2 tickets side by side but then again, I once had a friend go collect some winners and pick up some games for me. He bought all the tickets side-by-side. All were small prize winners. Amazing, I thought. You just can't tell.
DeleteI will, however, not buy a game from a retailer who has previously sold a top prize from that location. A valid "strategy" or just dumb superstition? I'll leave that up to others to discuss/decide.
Good luck.
A lot of wisdom in that Tommy. Thanks for posting.
DeleteI'm not sure there are any $5+ games where you can stop scratching before your first win. The match 3 symbol games usually have a special symbol - star, horseshoe, etc. So if you scratch two different symbols don't skip to the next line! And it's always a good idea to scan them anyway.
DeleteI thought I won $200 and because I thought I read the payouts correctly off the pdf assumed that was it. When I went to cash it, it was in fact 3 line winner for $1350. I've also had a few winning tickets of small prizes I thought were losers.
I have encountered the special symbol. It acts as a wild multiplier. As such, I believe you do need the two remaining symbols on the same line to be the same. I've never encountered the special symbol with two different symbols on the same line. Even then, one wouldn't have 3 of a kind. I would be interested if anyone on this board has seen this.
DeleteBut as you said, double checking tickets should be standard procedure.
Wow!! That must have been quite the thrill for you! And I think that's good advice, to have them scanned. I've had the pleasure of winning more than I originally thought, when having my super bingo's scanned, even though I always double-check them.
DeleteSince I only play the match 3 games sparingly it would only be natural that I wouldn't likely see a special symbol and for a while it was like a mythical creature -- something you hear about but never see. 8-)). So yes, it was a thrill. Nice to know it truly existed!
DeleteCashingo #1820 Small Prize Payout (<150 games): Hit rate of 1-in-3.29 and SPP return of 53.875%.
ReplyDeleteI went to pick up a gift pack or two this morning from my local lady who had lots available the last time I checked. She told me she was told there are no more grand prizes, and as of yesterday, has sent back her remaining packs. Last I checked, there are atill 3 Gp's. Whaddup with that?!! Damn, OLG!
ReplyDeleteI often ask retailers about specific games just for fun. What I have learnt is that they are in the business of selling tickets - no more. Anyone reading this blog has much more awareness of what is going on than any retailer.
ReplyDeleteIs it true that the Gift Packs have been pulled? I recall from last year that the Xmas games continued to be sold well into February.
She showed me the print-out, and the cancellation date was January 2!
ReplyDeleteHere is an interesting story about a scratch-off misprint:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.cnn.com/2015/01/06/us/us-new-mexico-lottery-ticket-misprint/index.html
http://www.cp24.com/mobile/brampton-man-settles-with-olg-over-lottery-ticket-misprint-1.357898
DeleteHere is a similar OLG story...they gave him a undisclosed settlement of "hush" money
There's too many games going on. Heck there are 3 CFL running! There's only so much room in the trays. Something like 20 games being offered dilutes things in my opinion.
ReplyDeleteAgreed. And this is causing some stores to only stock some of the games, meaning I have to check more than one store to find my preferred game.
DeleteAnyone know when PlayOLG is supposed to launch to the general public? Their website says 2014 but that is obviously incorrect.
ReplyDeleteA new $5 Crossword Tripler is now listed on the OLG unclaimed prize page - the prizes appear to be essentialy the same as the current game - expect to see it available this Monday.
ReplyDeleteBonus CFL lost another grand prize. .2 remaining...wasn't me..
ReplyDeleteI'll have to post a pack report soon kinda reading things that don't sound ethical..lucky lines has been for sale with no grand prizes for close to 3 months , it doesn't sit well with me if they pulled the gift packs or spectacular while theres grand prizes unclaimed. .ethics fair gaming transparency and all the other crap OLG preaches..
Current Scratch Tickets Estimated Odds 1/2
ReplyDelete(from info on the OLG unclaimed prize page as of 6am Thursday January 8th)
$50,000+
$10 HOLIDAY SPECTACULAR 1 in 67,250
1 x $250,000 - 1 x $100,000
$10 BEJEWELED 1 in 137,800
4 x $250,000 - 2 x $100,000 - 4 x $50,000
$10 INSTANT GIFT PACK 1 in 189,200
3 x $50,000
$5 CROSSWORD TRIPLER 1 in 346,772
5 x $100,000
$5 20X LUCKY 1 in 381,111
4 x $100,000
$10 CADILLAC RICHES 1 in 384,885
6 x $250,000 - 2 x $100,000
$5 HIT THE JACKPOT 1 in 459,667
6 x $100,000
$4 BONUS CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 529,222
2 x $675,000 - 1 x $100,000
$20 200 MILLION $ EXTRAORDINAIRE 1 in 597,153
5 x $2,000,000 - 12 x $200,000
$10 100 MILLION $ FORTUNE 1 in 599,016
9 x $1,000,000 - 2 x $100,000 - 8 x $50,000
$3 CASHINGO 1 in 762,025
4 x $75,000
$5 MERRY MONEY MULTIPLIER 1 in 854,737
1 x $100,000
$2 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 896,867
7 x $67,500 (est.)
$3 HOLLY JOLLY TRIPLER 1 in 1,046,500
1 x $75,000
$3 SCRABBLE 1 in 1,312,629
1 x $75,000
$4 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 1,838,877
1 x $675,000
$3 SUPER BINGO 1 in 1,909,023
3 x $50,000
$4 DOUBLE CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 1,988,428
4 x $1,350,000 (est.) - 1 x $50,000
$3 KENO (green) 1 in 1,996,137
2 x $50,000
$3 CROSSWORD (blue) 1 in 2,997,500
4 x $50,000
$5,000+
$10 INSTANT GIFT PACK 1 in 27,029
$10 BEJEWELED 1 in 62,636
$10 HOLIDAY SPECTACULAR 1 in 67,250
$5 MERRY MONEY MULTIPLIER 1 in 170,947
$5 CROSSWORD TRIPLER 1 in 192,651
$10 100 MILLION $ FORTUNE 1 in 192,903
$3 SCRABBLE 1 in 218,772
$10 CADILLAC RICHES 1 in 236,852
$20 200 MILLION $ EXTRAORDINAIRE 1 in 327,471
$3 HOLLY JOLLY TRIPLER 1 in 348,833
$3 CASHINGO 1 in 381,013
$5 20X LUCKY 1 in 381,111
$1 WILD 8s DOUBLER 1 in 403,732
$3 SUPER BINGO 1 in 409,076
$2 HOLIDAY CASHOUT 1 in 452,448
$5 HIT THE JACKPOT 1 in 459,667
$3 CROSSWORD (pink) 1 in 461,978
$4 BONUS CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 529,222
$3 CROSSWORD (blue) 1 in 545,000
$3 KENO (green) 1 in 570,325
$2 ROYAL 7`S 1 in 728,245
$2 BLACKJACK DOUBLER 1 in 736,250
$1 CROSSWORD EXPRESS 1 in 812.667
$2 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 896,867
$3 MORE LUCKY LINES 1 in 909,736
$4 DOUBLE CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 1,420,306
$4 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 1,838,877
Current Scratch Tickets Estimated Odds 2/2
ReplyDelete$1,000+
$10 INSTANT GIFT PACK 1 in 9,786
$5 CASH IN 1 in 15,286
$10 BEJEWELED 1 in 19,139
$10 CADILLAC RICHES 1 in 21,684
$5 MERRY MONEY MULTIPLIER 1 in 26,711
$20 200 MILLION $ EXTRAORDINAIRE 1 in 26,856
$2 ROYAL 7`S 1 in 26,972
$5 HIT THE JACKPOT 1 in 41,164
$3 MORE LUCKY LINES 1 in 41,352
$4 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 52,539
$10 HOLIDAY SPECTACULAR 1 in 67,250
$2 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 82,606
$4 BONUS CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 83,561
$4 DOUBLE CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 87,212
$3 HOLLY JOLLY TRIPLER 1 in 95,136
$10 100 MILLION $ FORTUNE 1 in 125,069
$5 20X LUCKY 1 in 152,444
$2 HOLIDAY CASHOUT 1 in 169,668
$5 CROSSWORD TRIPLER 1 in 173,386
$3 SCRABBLE 1 in 218,772
$2 BLACKJACK DOUBLER 1 in 245,417
$3 KENO (green) 1 in 266,152
$3 CASHINGO 1 in 381,013
$1 WILD 8s DOUBLER 1 in 403,732
$3 SUPER BINGO 1 in 409,076
$3 CROSSWORD (pink) 1 in 461,978
$3 CROSSWORD (blue) 1 in 545,000
$1 CROSSWORD EXPRESS 1 in 812,667
$250+
$5 HIT THE JACKPOT 1 in 1,354
$5 20X LUCKY 1 in 2,549
$10 INSTANT GIFT PACK 1 in 4,615
$5 MERRY MONEY MULTIPLIER 1 in 6,105
$10 CADILLAC RICHES 1 in 6,183
$10 BEJEWELED 1 in 8,402
$5 CROSSWORD TRIPLER 1 in 8,984
$3 CASHINGO 1 in 9,126
$20 200 MILLION $ EXTRAORDINAIRE 1 in 9,470
$5 CASH IN 1 in 9.586
$3 MORE LUCKY LINES 1 in 17,165
$4 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 25,190
$3 SCRABBLE 1 in 25,738
$2 ROYAL 7`S 1 in 26,972
$3 HOLLY JOLLY TRIPLER 1 in 29,069
$4 BONUS CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 36,922
$2 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 47,204
$4 DOUBLE CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 52,327
$10 HOLIDAY SPECTACULAR 1 in 67,250
$10 100 MILLION $ FORTUNE 1 in 70,691
$2 HOLIDAY CASHOUT 1 in 169,668
$2 BLACKJACK DOUBLER 1 in 245,417
$3 KENO (green) 1 in 266,152
$1 WILD 8s DOUBLER 1 in 403.732
$3 SUPER BINGO 1 in 409,076
$3 CROSSWORD (pink) 1 in 461,978
$3 CROSSWORD (blue) 1 in 545,000
$1 CROSSWORD EXPRESS 1 in 812,667
$50+
$20 200 MILLION $ EXTRAORDINAIRE 1 in 14
$10 CADILLAC RICHES 1 in 18
$10 BEJEWELED 1 in 33
$10 HOLIDAY SPECTACULAR 1 in 33
$10 100 MILLION $ FORTUNE 1 in 37
$10 INSTANT GIFT PACK 1 in 55
$5 MERRY MONEY MULTIPLIER 1 in 232
$5 CASH IN 1 in 241
$5 CROSSWORD TRIPLER 1 in 396
$3 HOLLY JOLLY TRIPLER 1 in 444
$3 MORE LUCKY LINES 1 in 469
$5 20X LUCKY 1 in 543
$3 CROSSWORD (blue) 1 in 666
$3 CROSSWORD (pink) 1 in 666
$5 HIT THE JACKPOT 1 in 831
$3 CASHINGO 1 in 847
$3 SUPER BINGO 1 in 1,144
$3 SCRABBLE 1 in 1,212
$4 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 1,392
$2 ROYAL 7`S 1 in 1,601
$4 BONUS CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 1,800
$1 CROSSWORD EXPRESS 1 in 1,995
$1 WILD 8s DOUBLER 1 in 1,997
$4 DOUBLE CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 2,100
$2 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 2,374
$1 LUCKY LINES EXPRESS 1 in 3,000
$2 HOLIDAY CASHOUT 1 in 6,433
$2 BLACKJACK DOUBLER 1 in 6,501
$3 KENO (green) 1 in 6,824
Odds to win your ticket price back:
ReplyDelete$10 CADILLAC RICHES 1 in 6.10
$5 CROSSWORD TRIPLER 1 in 7.37
$3 MORE LUCKY LINES 1 in 7.40
$3 CASHINGO 1 in 7.57
$3 SCRABBLE 1 in 7.78
$3 SUPER BINGO 1 in 7.81
$1 LUCKY LINES EXPRESS 1 in 7.94
$1 WILD 8s DOUBLER 1 in 8.00
$3 KENO (green) 1 in 8.00
$10 HOLIDAY SPECTACULAR 1 in 8.33
$2 BLACKJACK DOUBLER 1 in 8.33
$10 BEJEWELED 1 in 8.36
$10 INSTANT GIFT PACK 1 in 8.52
$3 HOLLY JOLLY TRIPLER 1 in 8.66
$2 ROYAL 7`S 1 in 8.74
$3 CROSSWORD (pink) 1 in 8.75
$3 CROSSWORD (blue) 1 in 8.75
$5 CASH IN 1 in 9.30
$5 MERRY MONEY MULTIPLIER 1 in 9.33
$4 BONUS CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 9.79
$20 200 MILLION $ EXTRAORDINAIRE 1 in 9.98
$1 CROSSWORD EXPRESS 1 in 9.98
$2 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 10.00
$4 DOUBLE CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 10.16
$10 100 MILLION $ FORTUNE 1 in 10.48
$5 HIT THE JACKPOT 10.91
$5 20X LUCKY 1 in 10.91
$4 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 12.30
$2 HOLIDAY CASHOUT 1 in 12.33
Rating to win 2x-5x your $ or better:
$5 HIT THE JACKPOT 73/100
$5 CASH IN 70/100
$5 20X LUCKY 65/100
$2 CASH FOR LIFE 64/100
$5 CROSSWORD TRIPLER 63/100
$5 MERRY MONEY MULTIPLIER 62/100
$3 CROSSWORD (blue) 61/100
$3 CROSSWORD (pink) 61/100
$4 BONUS CASH FOR LIFE 60/100
$2 BLACKJACK DOUBLER 57/100
$10 100 MILLION $ FORTUNE 56/100
$3 KENO (green) 55/100
$4 CASH FOR LIFE 54/100
$3 SUPER BINGO 53/100
$10 CADILLAC RICHES 52/100
$1 WILD 8s DOUBLER 51/100
$10 HOLIDAY SPECTACULAR 46/100
$3 HOLLY JOLLY TRIPLER 40/100
$2 HOLIDAY CASHOUT 38/100
$10 BEJEWELED 37/100
$2 ROYAL 7`S 36/100
$1 LUCKY LINES EXPRESS 35/100
$10 INSTANT GIFT PACK 34/100
$3 SCRABBLE 30/100
$1 CROSSWORD EXPRESS 28/100
$4 DOUBLE CASH FOR LIFE 26/100
$20 200 MILLION $ EXTRAORDINAIRE 25/100
$3 CASHINGO 23/100
$3 MORE LUCKY LINES 19/100
Odds of winning any prize:
$20 200 MILLION $ EXTRAORDINAIRE 1 in 3.00
$10 INSTANT GIFT PACK 1 in 3.17
$3 CASHINGO 1 in 3.24
$3 SUPER BINGO 1 in 3.25
$3 MORE LUCKY LINES 1 in 3.27
$10 CADILLAC RICHES 1 in 3.28
$10 100 MILLION $ FORTUNE 1 in 3.28
$10 HOLIDAY SPECTACULAR 1 in 3.30
$10 BEJEWELED 1 in 3.32
$3 SCRABBLE 1 in 3.33
$1 CROSSWORD EXPRESS 1 in 3.35
$3 KENO (green) 1 in 3.40
$2 HOLIDAY CASHOUT 1 in 3.47
$3 HOLLY JOLLY TRIPLER 1 in 3.63
$5 CROSSWORD TRIPLER 1 in 3.70
$4 DOUBLE CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 3.70
$1 WILD 8s DOUBLER 1 in 3.72
$2 ROYAL 7`S 1 in 3.74
$5 MERRY MONEY MULTIPLIER 1 in 3.80
$3 CROSSWORD (pink) 1 in 3.84
$3 CROSSWORD (blue) 1 in 3.84
$1 LUCKY LINES EXPRESS 1 in 3.84
$2 BLACKJACK DOUBLER 1 in 3.87
$2 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 3.97
$4 BONUS CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 3.99
$4 CASH FOR LIFE 1 in 4.01
$5 CASH IN 1 in 4.13
$5 20X LUCKY 1 in 4.21
$5 HIT THE JACKPOT 1 in 4.40
Current Top Rated Games
ReplyDelete1 - $10 CADILLAC RICHES 80/100
2 - $10 INSTANT GIFT PACK 78/100
3 - $10 BEJEWELED 75/100
4 - $5 CROSSWORD TRIPLER 72/100
5 - $10 HOLIDAY SPECTACULAR 69/100
6 - $5 MERRY MONEY MULTIPLIER 67/100
7 - $20 200 MILLION $ EXTRAORDINAIRE 64/100
8 - $10 100 MILLION $ FORTUNE 57/100
9 - $5 HIT THE JACKPOT 56/100
10 - $5 20X LUCKY 55/100
11 - $3 CASHINGO 54/100
12 - $3 HOLLY JOLLY TRIPLER 53/100
13 - $3 SCRABBLE 52/100
14 - $3 SUPER BINGO 48/100
15 - $3 MORE LUCKY LINES 47/100
16 - $5 CASH IN 46/100
17 - $4 BONUS CASH FOR LIFE 44/100
18 - $2 CASH FOR LIFE 39/100
19 - $2 ROYAL 7`S 38/100
20 - $3 KENO (green) 37/100
21 - $3 CROSSWORD (blue) 36/100
22 - $4 CASH FOR LIFE 35/100
23 - $1 WILD 8s DOUBLER 34/100
24 - $3 CROSSWORD (pink) 33/100
25 - $2 BLACKJACK DOUBLER 29/100
26 - $4 DOUBLE CASH FOR LIFE 28/100
27 - $2 HOLIDAY CASHOUT 26/100
28 - $1 CROSSWORD EXPRESS 19/100
29 - $1 LUCKY LINES EXPRESS 18/100
Current Top Rated Games (by ticket price)
$20 200 MILLION $ EXTRAORDINAIRE 64/100
$10 CADILLAC RICHES 80/100
$10 INSTANT GIFT PACK 78/100
$10 BEJEWELED 75/100
$10 HOLIDAY SPECTACULAR 69/100
$10 100 MILLION $ FORTUNE 57/100
$5 CROSSWORD TRIPLER 72/100
$5 MERRY MONEY MULTIPLIER 67/100
$5 HIT THE JACKPOT 56/100
$5 20X LUCKY 55/100
$5 CASH IN 46/100
$4 BONUS CASH FOR LIFE 44/100
$4 CASH FOR LIFE 35/100
$4 DOUBLE CASH FOR LIFE 28/100
$3 CASHINGO 54/100
$3 HOLLY JOLLY TRIPLER 53/100
$3 SCRABBLE 52/100
$3 SUPER BINGO 48/100
$3 MORE LUCKY LINES 47/100
$3 KENO (green) 37/100
$3 CROSSWORD (blue) 36/100
$3 CROSSWORD (pink) 33/100
$2 CASH FOR LIFE 39/100
$2 ROYAL 7`S 38/100
$2 BLACKJACK DOUBLER 29/100
$2 HOLIDAY CASHOUT 26/100
$1 WILD 8s DOUBLER 34/100
$1 CROSSWORD EXPRESS 19/100
$1 LUCKY LINES EXPRESS 18/100
Looks like PlayOLG is now live. Although I tried to register and the age verification failed. I have to send in a scan of my driver's license and wait 2-3 business days for confirmation. As soon as they approve me, I will be playing. Hopefully this does not happen to too many others who go to register.
ReplyDeleteI got in early during the testing. They approved my license scan in a couple hours. The only thing I did not like was the matching bonus money is basically useless. You need to win 30x your deposit before it becomes cash value. I did run $50 bonus up to $250 but I was about $2,000 away from being able to cash it. In other words, no chance.
DeleteIt has good report and history tracking and buying Lotto tickets is easy but since you have to deposit money not really friendly just for that. It did not like my credit cards, I had to use direct deposit to get money into the site.
Hi Jay
DeleteI too got an invite to play early and so did Doug I believe, they gave me 10.00 in bonus money but you could only play it on Slots which I lost pretty fast, I haven't deposited any money since I know RNG's is basically BS, they track what you play and how you play the games, I've played on-line for years and Canadian's use to be able to play live games which I did great on and then Surprise they pulled the plug and said Canadians can no longer play live so I gave up on gambling online. I may try 15.00 on black jack but not sure yet. As long as you play even in fun mode they won't charge you so I was told by OLG but if your account sits inactive for 12 months you will be charged.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/4jd1n8y5gs8b0z6/20150108_181316.jpg?dl=0
ReplyDeleteHere's today's pack report:
It appears all the holiday games were cancelled on jan 02..just like another poster mentioned. .
some of these games were good to us and rated well in the odds..$2 holiday cash out has all top prizes remaining. .I had wished they would have been around longer..so if you like them get them soon because the retailers cannot activate any new not previously activated packs and some retailers empty their entire inventory for return to olg.
2 new games coming:
$5 1822 diamond 7's Jan 12
$10 1792 classic ruby jan 14
...and the new $5 cross tripler was released on Jan 07
..GL everyone
Its so bullshit how olg cancelled hollyjolly with 1 grand prize remain while luckyline is still for sale with no grandprize
ReplyDeleteIf the OLG can save $, It seems it's unspoken policy to cancel a game at any time using any possible excuse. The ticket i rate as #2, $10 Gift Pack, is near impossible to find where i am. As of TODAY It has 3 of 6 grand prizes remaining. It has 40% of it's top 300 prizes unclaimed and an estimated (30%) float of 560,000 remaining gift packs. How could it possibly be that all of these were gone within 1 week after christmas? Have half a million + of these been reclaimed and shredded for recycling? Perhaps many of these remaining gift packs were never even actually printed? I`m sure any call to the OLG will only result in some lame answer as "poor sales after christmas..". I beleive the real answer is that the OLG will save an estimated $3.8 MILLION in unclaimed prizes for this game, using such an excuse. I get the sense that the crappy $2 Holiday Cashout game will still be around awhile tho. 0_o
Deleteholiday cashout still has all grand prizes remaining tho i remembered pink lucky lines olg pulled the game while all the top prizes remaining, bullshit
DeleteAnyone know if a retailer can play on playolg.ca?
ReplyDeleteYes, they can since there is no actual location. Says so in the FAQ.
DeleteNEW $5 Crossword Tripler (pink) - Review
ReplyDeleteGrand prize: 15 x $100,000
Next top prize: 6 x $10,000
Number of tickets: 8,625,400
All available prizes and odds to win:
$5 or more (any prize) - 1 in 3.70
$10 or more - 1 in 7.43
$15 or more - 1 in 10.11
$20 or more - 1 in 15.81
$30 or more - 1 in 54.83
$50 or more - 1 in 396
$60 or more - 1 in 688
$75 or more - 1 in 857
$90 or more - 1 in 1,499
$100 or more - 1 in 2,207
$150 or more - 1 in 2,317
$225 or more - 1 in 3,951
$300 or more - 1 in 9,070
$1,000 or more - 1 in 319,459
$10,000 or more - 1 in 410,733
$100,000 - 1 in 575,027
Out of all 30 games:
Ranks 9th on winning $50,000+
Ranks 15th on winning $5,000+
Ranks 23rd on winning $1,000+
Ranks 8th on winning $250+
Ranks 9th on winning $50+
Ranks 3rd on winning 2x-5x your $ or better
Ranks 2nd on winning a ticket price back
Ranks 15th on winning any prize
Essentially the same as the current ticket. The good news: 15 grand prizes of $100,000 is double what the other $5 games offer. The bad news: to make such possible means very few other top prizes. There are only 12 of those within 8.6 million tickets that are above $300. It's the ideal game for those who prefer entertainment value / time it takes to play. While it's average on odds to win any prize, it's very good on odds to win 1-5x on your $. The number of tickets printed, prizes, quantity of prizes, and odds to win, are basicly the same as the current game. The "tripler" feature comes at odds of 1 in 21 and are 77% $15, 21% $30 and 2% $60-$300. I rate this game 65/100, making it 7th out of all 30 games and 3rd out of the 6 $5 tickets.
With a Small Prize Payout (175 Games) hit rate of 1-in-3.73 and expected value return of 58.850% this game should provide a lot of play from small wins.
DeleteWhat I like about this game is the high amounts of 2x-6x prizes (almost equalling the 1x prizes).
Although not really my type of game, I'm inclined to give it a couple/few plays.
Just thought I would share a small...SMALL victory I have experienced today! After purchasing 4 gift packs a couple of days ago, I traded in my free cash for life coupons. Out of those 4, I won on 3- $2, $2 and $5. (Oh ya, I won $10 and $25 on the GP's...traded $30 of that for a Wild 10 and 2 spectaculars and lost, so all hope was rising on these Cfl's to keep the ball rolling....) Anyhoo, this morning I cashed in that $9 3 Super Bingo's and won $15 (3 4 corners)! Yay! Then I rolled that into 1 bejewelled and crossword tripler. Scratched the bejewelled first- nothing. Damn! Did the crossword- nothing...until the bonus area revealed 3 matching symbols for $20!!! So today I turned $9 into $20. Small $$ but a fun day for me, nonetheless. Btw, this is my third time winning on those symbols and I don't buy many of this game. Makes me happy :)
ReplyDeleteNow that the new crosstrippler is out, Let's wait and see how long it takes for OLG to cancel the old crosstrippler with five grand prizes remaining. Bet they are not even getting printed, remember lucky lines.
ReplyDeleteReading that they are cancelling tickets from Christmas, that still have grand prizes, is disgusting. To hear the excuses from the OLG makes me so angry.
In a previous post, erroneous tickets might be slipped into the floats for those who only scan the bar code. This scenario possibly satisfy's the number of grand prizes, most likely for complicated games. Should someone actually uncover a winner then it's considered a misprint. I wouldn't put it past em.
How do you think Ontario is going to reduce the 300 billion deficit? Can't you tell ever since luckylines was kiboshed something isn't making sense with OLG.
Trust me, I have regrettably been playing scratch tickets for years and the most I've ever won is nothing to write home about. I know the odds are terrible but for the amount of games I've played it's hard to believe.
End rant
Has anyone noticed, on the 2$ holiday cashout, the numbers on the far right don't seem to be underneath the layer of latex. The way the ticket is printed gives the illusion that there are no numbers to bee uncovered beneath the far right laytex. Let's wait and see how many grand prizes remain for this game when they pull it!
ReplyDeleteyes i noticed that too i bought 3 n it wasnt til the last one i was scratchin that i realized there were more #s so iwent back n finished scratchin.. still losers lol
DeleteNot sure how many people know this, but when a game gets "deactivated" like the gift pack was January 2nd olg makes sure the grand prizes get pulled. this means that if a retailer activated a winning ticket after the deactivation date they get told to ship it back instead of selling it because they don't want to hand out big prizes. thought I would share how scammy the olg really is.
ReplyDeleteWow. That is really enlightening. I would not have pursued fruit explosions had I known that! Thanks for the info!
DeleteIt makes sense right? They won't bother asking for the losing tickets or small paying tickets but as soon as a big prize is scanned I'm sure they call that retailer and tell them to pull it knowing which ticket number it is. thanks olg
DeleteA retailer cannot activate a pack of tickets after the activation end date has passed...the olg kiosk they scan to activate a pack will prevent that from happening. ..so if you buy a winning ticket tomorrow say on spectacular that was cancelled on January 02 it is a valid prize...provided it was activated before jan 02. .
Delete..another point of interest is should a store be robbed of unactivated bulk packs of scratch offs and the thrift tried to redeem winner tickets the police would roll up on them pretty quickly because the kiosk would have those tickets redflagged...ironic how they steal are grandprize tickets away from us at their discretion ...but if someone tries to steal from them they get a free stay at the crowbar hotel ..all inclusive meals included..lol..
So just to clarify, winning tickets that are part of activated packs are NOT recalled once a game is cancelled? Like I mentioned before, I found a store with a bunch of Wild 10's. In my current understanding, this means there potentially is a $10,000 winning ticket among them, even though the game has been cancelled. As opposed to the OLG recalling all the grand prize tickets, even if they come from activated packs. Can someone clear this up for me? Thanks :)
DeleteIf you purchase an activated ticket your prize is VALID. .provided it is not an expired ticket..I have seen a retailer unknowingly selling expired tickets which I believe are NOT valid..hope im not making a simple answer confusing..
DeleteThe games that were cancelled on Jan 02 all prizes are VALID
With reference to games cancelled on jan 02 , retailers cannot activate any more not previously activated packs even if they wished to..
DeleteGames cancelled on Jan 02 are supposed to be emptied from trays and entire inventory of said games returned back to olg...however most retailers continue to sell their already activated tickets because of the hassle and paper work and waiting to get their money redeemed...just a total headache..so most retailers continue to sell said games which is fine and the prizes are still valid until the ticket passes its expiration date which is printed on the back in the fine print. .
..or if you really concerned about certain games just call olg..they're very polite and helpful with easy questions...
Thanks Darth! I feel pretty clear on the validity of activated tickets. What I am seeking clarification on is in reference to what an anonymous poster shared:
Delete"Not sure how many people know this, but when a game gets "deactivated" like the gift pack was January 2nd olg makes sure the grand prizes get pulled. this means that if a retailer activated a winning ticket after the deactivation date they get told to ship it back instead of selling it because they don't want to hand out big prizes. thought I would share how scammy the olg really is."
I suppose one way to find out for sure is to ask retailers if they are in fact asked to send back Grand Prize winning tickets from activated packs once the game is cancelled.
Uplifter,
DeleteThis is getting a bit confused. Once the OLG instructs retailers not to activate any new packs of tickets, a retailer is unable to do so. As Darth explained earlier, if the pack had already been activated then they can continue to sell the tickets even though the OLG asks that all tickets, including those that are activated and unsold.
The next critical date is the game cancelation date. That dateIt usually many months into the future after the deactivation date. This makes sense as people could have bought activated tickets but chosen not the scratch them right away. Once the cancelation date has passed the OLG will not honour any prizes.
This creates a potential scenario that a retailer could be selling tickets for games that are beyond the cancelation date of the game. Or, a player could have purchased a ticket earlier and for some reason not scratched it by the game cancelation date. If the ticket is a winner, the purchaser is unable to claim the prize. I had a discussion with the OLG about this one day and was told that this does happen and it represents the toughest calls for folks that work at the OLG Call Center. I have no doubt of that.
Hope that is clear.
Doug
Ha! This is getting confusing. And I think I know why! I've been using the the word "cancelled" instead of "deactivation"!
DeleteI'll put it this way...is the following true:
..."if a retailer activated a winning ticket after the deactivation date they get told to ship it back instead of selling it because they don't want to hand out big prizes. thought I would share how scammy the olg really is."
The answer to this question is the one that I seek...!
Uplifter,
DeleteHere is my understanding: The retailer activates tickets by the package (70 tickets in a package as reported by others). If the package is activated before the deactivation date then they can be sold. If the package is not activated before the deactivation date then the retailer will be unable to activate and subsequently sell those tickets.
The assertion approaches an assumption that the OLG knows which tickets are the winning Grand Prize tickets and where they were sent for sale. I don't believe that is the case for two reasons:
1. If it were true that would be a scandalous situation.
2. The OLG is guaranteed to make money on all games. They don't need to rely on chicanery to increase profits.
What annoys folks on this blog is that, at any one time, the OLG is aware of how many Grand Prizes are available for any game. Of the tickets that remain unsold some may not have been printed, some will be in stores in packages awaiting activation, some will have been activated and are available for sale, and others may have been sold and not yet scratched. Of those four categories I would estimate that the vast majority of unsold tickets are in the first two categories. Therefore, when the OLG announces a deactivation date for a game, they become the likely winners of all outstanding Grand Prizes. On occasion, the Grand Prize(s) may be in one of the last two categories and end up being cashed later on but I suspect that that is a rare outcome.
Not good for the player but short of scandalous. The question that I'm considering is what we as players can do to correct this perceived problem.
Doug
Thank you so much, Doug. I tend to be naive and trusting, and so to even consider the the OLG may be in the business of culling winning tickets at their will seems a bit too much like living in a Brave New World! I realize of course that "the house always wins", but at the same time, I would prefer to believe that the game is as "fair" as possible! Thanks for taking the time to share your knowledge....and as always...may the force be with you...;)
Deleteum check out one of the straight flush winners today on all in poker. They won $13,666.60 seems like a bad number lol
ReplyDeletek maybe its me seeing these bad numbers lol the number i had to write to publish that comment was 187 n i dont check out the winners jus randomly stumbled upon it
DeleteIts beelzebubbs game shannon..lol..back last summer a plaza in etobicoke sold two big prizes in a week...666 hurontario..
ReplyDeleteI don't normally pay attention to numbers but sometimes they are creepy..
I'm no techy but can anyone explain why I have to prove I'm not a ROBOT to post on here..I assume everyone has to prove they aren't robot's
ReplyDeleteThat's weird because up until a couple of weeks ago I had to prove I wasn't a robot then it stopped. It just publishes right away now. Did this just suddenly start for you?
Delete-Gift pack lost 2 more grand prizes..1 remaining, less upset now about it being cancelled. .
ReplyDelete-bejewelled lost another grand prize..poor float verses grand prize ratio.
-both hit jackpot and orange cross tripler lost grand prizes .
Bought 10 hs and did horrible. 2-10 1-15 1-10. Are they good to cash in?
ReplyDelete`"hs"- Holiday Spectacular i take it - that ticket is valid to cash in until April 30, 2017 - it says that right on the back of the ticket... 0_o
DeleteThanks, I found a spot with a lot left and funny thing happened, just went and found 3 gp lol
DeleteIn my view, any conspiracy theory some of you have on the OLG and ticket sellers is debunked by the fact both are so inept and kept "out of the loop" that it's simply not possible - i know someone who works for the OLG who essentially told me recently in confidence the same thing - such as: "we are under incredibly strict rules since that fake lotto claim by a retailer a few years ago", "the sales rep for a specific region is the only OLG person to be in contact with the seller only on a regularly scheduled once per week basis", "a sales rep is only knowing of specific product and quantity which they are explicitly instructed upon to confirm, distribute or reclaim, NEVER anything about prizes", "an independant third party handles all reclaimed tickets to ensure security and integrity", "we specify on what our retailers are to sell and how to be displayed" - the $10 Gift Pack had 2 of it's grand prizes won AFTER the end activation date, so obviously no funny business going on there - the $ value on unawarded grand prizes combined with other remaining top prizes tends to be less than 1% of the value of ALL reclaimed tickets for a when a game ends - the OLG and retailers really only have one thing in mind, and that's SELLING tickets as often as possible to make as much $ as possible, rewarding of prizes is a far off secondary issue - it's been said on this blog many times before, that many of us here, are MORE knowing that those we buy our tickets from - if you don't like how or what someone sells, then just don't buy from them - the vast majority of ticket buyers are with wishful intuition not factual insight as the regulars of Doug's blog are, so we here could never effect change with the OLG, we can help each other here to improve our odds by sharing our knowledge and experiences here tho - good luck + happy scratching everybody (^_^)
ReplyDeleteCL66,
DeleteIt is my view that all criteria for deactivating games should be objective. At present, all the criteria with the exception of one fit that definition. The problem is that every controversial decision taken by the OLG turns out to be subjective.
Without looking back at previous posts, I recall working out that the OLG increased its overall profit for the infamous More Lucky Lines game by 10% when the cancelled it with all three Grand Prizes still outstanding. I still have a problem with that. The rationale provided by the OLG in support of its subjective decision does not hold water, in my opinion.
I am also not entirely convinced that the printing and distribution of tickets is entirely random. I have yet to undertake an analysis of the situation but it strikes me that an unusually high number of Grand Prize winning tickets are sold in rural areas. Over time, those tickets should appear on the same relative basis as ticket sales. How long I would have to measure such a thing in order to form any reasonable conclusions is something that I'm not sure about. I would say at least six months.
My personal "conspiracy theory" is that tickets are printed and distributed by zones. The printing algorithm may be set to have the Grand Prizes distributed to particular zones. There might be 10-15 zones in the province. In that way a winning ticket could be designated to a particular zone and the OLG would be able to say that the process was random. And, in a way, it was. What you do think of my theory?
Doug
oops - typo - meant 10% not 1% - d'oh! (0_o)
ReplyDeleteThank you, CL66. As I replied to Doug, I way prefer to believe that the game is on the up and up, and that I make my own luck, through honing intuition and imbuing my choices with knowledge and strategy. Good luck to you and happy scratching on this beautiful snowy day...:)
ReplyDeleteHey Guys,
ReplyDeleteQuestion for you - I keep buying cross tripler and NEVER ever ever win anything...not even my money back. Probably bought about 20 tickets this whole year. Anybody experience anything similar?
Despite the math, luck is the overriding factor. And just as the average man's height is six feet, the height of the next man you see won't necessarily be exactly six feet.
DeleteEven my statement, "With a Small Prize Payout (175 Games) hit rate of 1-in-3.73 and expected value return of 58.850%..." is based on 175 games played and averaged results.
Like some commercials say on t.v., "Your results may vary", "Possible side effects might include nausea" (especially with long losing streaks!), etc..
I've had losing streaks (16-in-a-row being the longest), loses on games with odds 1-in-2.70 and wins on games with odds 1-in-4.50. Sometimes you just can't predict an exact result.
You might find your luck to be totally different with some other game instead.
Remember, "Life is 99.9999% luck. The other HALF is a strong grasp of mathematics." 8-))
Sugar Girl,
ReplyDeleteMy sympathies. I have purchased two of the those tickets and won on each one. Go figure. That said, my tales of losing tickets on other games is much longer :-)
Doug
My wife does pretty good on them. I know she's won a couple of $50s. And quite often $15 & $30 on the triple. She pretty much plays them exclusively. Me, I hate them because you need too many words to win $5. However, I lose regularly on the $3 Crosswords.
DeleteGreat news - I just won $15 on fruit explosion (found 3 remaining tickets!)
ReplyDeleteI'm going to buy 3 crossword triplers and test my luck! stay tuned...although hopefully i get the new game...the orange ones are the old game i presume?
just ask enough questions and follow the paper trail and one will see how much greater the advantage is for the OLG
ReplyDeleteya, money they already taxed for that matter
ReplyDeleteHi Doug
ReplyDeleteHave you heard that there is 4 companies bidding on buying OLG? They are Bell, Rogers and I forget the other 2 but whomever pays more will be taking over OLG by July 15th of this year...Has anyone else heard about this, 3 different stores have told me this.
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