Australians’ common Lotto mistakes revealed before Powerball $80m jackpot

As Powerball’s $80 million jackpot nears, Australians’ common lotto mistakes have been revealed alongside the ticket many people buy to get closer to the top prize.

As the countdown to Powerball’s $80 million jackpot continues, Australians’ common lotto mistakes have been revealed alongside the ticket many people buy to get closer to the top prize.

Tonight's $80 million prize is the second biggest jackpot Powerball has offered in the game’s 23-year Australian history.

It comes after last week’s $50 million division one prize was not won by anyone across Australia.

It forced the Powerball prize jackpot to rise for the seventh week in a row.

The Lott spokesman Matt Hart told News Corp Australia that this morning, at its peak, more than 2,000 Powerball tickets were sold every minute across retail outlets.

They expect this to climb before the draw closes at 7.30pm AEDT.

He said there were several common mistakes players make when playing lotto, which can affect their chances of winning.

Mr Hart said the first mistake was a “happy” one, where a player buys the same entry twice and winning division one twice.

“What’s happened is they’ve bought an entry into the draw, forgotten that they’ve done that, and so bought another entry using their same ‘special’ numbers.

“So when their winning numbers came up, they won twice.”

A nurse from Heathmont in Victoria recently had this experience where she won more than $800,000 after she put two entries in to Saturday’s TattsLotto from two different outlets.

The woman’s System 7 marked entry, purchased from Euroa News & Lotto, in Euroa, also won other divisions which meant her total prize on that ticket was $447,095.04.

Her second winning entry was also a System 7 marked entry, purchased from Heathmont Authorised Newsagency, in Heathmont.

It also won other divisions bolstering her prize on that ticket to $447,095.04.

The east Melbourne resident took home a combined prize of $894,190,08.

Karen Webb serves a customer a ticket for Thursdays $80 million Powerball draw. Picture: Stuart McLean

“I thought my ticket had expired! I didn’t have the ticket with me so I couldn’t

check the date so I went and bought another one,” she explained.

“I usually buy six weeks at a time so I don’t have to keep going back and I just buy them for a bit of fun!

“I mark my numbers using family birthdays which is why I was able to mark the

same numbers when I was out at Euroa without my other ticket with me.

“When we checked our ticket at Euroa, the lady printed out a list of where the division one winning entries were won and on it was Heathmont which is where we live.

“I thought ‘what are the chances of someone in our suburb having the same numbers as us?’.

“When we got home I thought ‘maybe my ticket hadn’t expired’ so I checked it and we had won again!

“We went a bit over the top when we found out when we got home yesterday! I’m so glad we checked it!”

Mr Hart said other players don’t check their tickets properly.

“Often we call division one winners who didn’t know they had won division one, despite checking their tickets themselves,” he said.

“People might look at the results online and mark the numbers off their ticket to see if they have all the winning numbers. With this manual method, it can be easy to miss a number. We recommend people double-check their tickets at their local outlet or by scanning their ticket at home using the Lott app on their smartphone.”

Powerball is a popular lottery across Australia. Picture: Supplied

Mr Hart said some players don’t both to check their tickets at all.

“We have 12 unclaimed division one prizes worth more than $11.2 million across Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia,” he said.

“This means there are people who’ve bought an entry, not registered it to a players card (so we don’t know who they are), and haven’t checked their ticket. The lesson here is to check your tickets and also register your entry to a player’s card. By registering your ticket to a player’s card, your prize is secure and we know who you are so we can unite you with your prize.”

Some players also fail to answer their phone when being notified of their win.

“We normally call our registered division one winners the first business day after a draw, but for big draws like tonight’s $80 million Powerball we will reach out to any registered division one winners,” Mr Hart said.

“Often people don’t answer their phones, despite us trying to deliver some life-changing news.”

Many other players also throw their winning lottery tickets away by mistake.

In October last year, a married couple from the Blue Mountains in NSW found out they had

won in the Monday & Wednesday Lotto draw, but had to retrieve the winning ticket from the bin.

The Powerball jackpot is $80 million — and the PowerHit is a popular ticket to buy.

Their winning ticket was for a division one prize of $800,000, and they had bought it from Wentworth Falls Newsagency.

“First thing this morning I checked our email and got the Lotto results. I saw the

$800,000, but thought that can’t be right, so went and double checked the numbers,” the husband recalled.

“We then realised we had thrown the ticket out a few days ago so we went through the bin to find the ticket. It took a while, but we found it.”

THE POPULAR POWERBALL TICKET

Mr Hart said that many Powerball players choose to buy a PowerHit entry to get closer to the jackpot.

A PowerHit is a type of entry unique to Powerball as it guarantees the Powerball number, which players need to secure a division one win.

“Generally, about one-in-ten entries into a Powerball draw are PowerHit entries,” he said.

Looking back at Powerball division one winning entries last year, almost one-in-four of these were PowerHit entries.

But Mr Hart added that there were six division two winners across Australia in last week’s draw.

“Each of these winners took home $115,772.90. Now to win division two, you need all seven of the winning numbers, but not the Powerball. So essentially these six entries were one number off winning the jackpot!,” he said.