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Had a quick go last night and noticed it said on my ticket they are changing the percentage of payouts again. I had a big win last night of £2.60, could be life changing if I use it to but another one and win. Where does all that money go each week?
I buy a ticket whenever there's been a extra double quadruple roll over on the basis that if nobody else can be bothered to win I'm in with more of a chance
Where does all that money go each week?
Quite a surprising amount is paid back as prizes - because big prizes seem rare (as in too rare to even be paid out often these days) you get the feeling the split is something like 90% good causes, 10% prizes. But after sales costs (fees to retailers etc) more than 2/3rds is prize payouts and the rest 'good causes'
Nope ..the missus had a biggish win 20+ years ago ..and we haven't bothered since ..
Lightning doesn't strike twice ( or does it? ) ..
One of the lads I work(ed) with won £120k a few weeks ago and promptly quit his job ..just a young lad and has plans to start his own business..
My mother won £16k back in the early 00’s.
She still plays, buys a ticket for each of us each week... she may have won again, but I haven’t heard anything about any winnings 🤣🥴
Not even sure I’d want to win the big prize... plenty of stories of people’s lives turning to shit after they win millions. A few hundred k though would make life comfortable! Might start buying scratch cards 😂
I'm just going to check my ticket.
4 euro dips.
Only £7.40 down!
Play the Euro than National but still play.
Most of it is paid out in prizes.
It's just a tax on people who don't understand probability..
Having said that, I have a friend whose ex husband won £13m and promptly spunked the lot.
Still play, although usually only the Euro and the new Set for life one.
I'd quite happily take £10k a month for either the 12 months or 30 years.
Think the biggest win either me or the parents have had is £50.
Yep, have entered every draw since the day it started. I made the mistake of using the same numbers which are now etched into my brain and can never forget them. I cannot stop now as if I ever see a big win come up for my numbers I would be regretting it quite a lot!
Yep, I still pay the idiot tax. Have done since it started. My problem is that since I always play the same numbers, there's always the nagging thought that if I stopped, the very next draw would be my numbers.
I fully understand what an idiot I am, and have decided to accept that fact for the 1 in 100,000,000,000 chance it could be me who wins next. It's happened to other people after all...
bet you’re fun at parties 😂It’s just a tax on people who don’t understand probability..
It’s a tiny outgoing that most people wouldn’t even notice, versus the slimmest of chances to win a life changing sum. Even if the odds were 1000 times better most people still wouldn’t win. But someone’s got to!
Not to mention all of the community projects, etc that wouldn’t exist without it. I would say the NL is one of the most positive things to happen to the UK in my lifetime.
I still pay the poverty tax, although I don't keep any set numbers or games. Honestly got to be one of the unluckiest players in the uk, when you add up what you've probably spent in a year it's in the hundreds to get back £30 or £40 if that.
I think the lotto ties problem was people weren't playing it so they increased the price and the odds. People must be more attracted to mega prizes.
Play the euro millions, one lucky dip a couple of times a month, so £5 a month to dream about quitting my job and setting the kids up with houses. Not sure my £5.10 win from last night is quite enough to buy 5 houses in leafy Bucks 😕
I stopped about six months ago after playing it pretty much from the beginning (only a line or two a week) - biggest win was 4k 15 years ago.
Hadn't won anything in months so when Premium Bonds changed the rules so you could invest in £25 chunks I decided to do that instead.
So every month £25 goes in Premium Bonds now - I'm looking at it more as gambling without losing your stake than an investment.
Still got the same numbers since it started along with keeping a line I used to put on for my mum.
Wins are few and far between but, “you’ve gotta be in it to win it!” 😆 (I’ll still be saying that in 20 years time)
The F.I.L won the Euromillions superdraw raffle in 2014, Million quid and a £50,000 holiday, he was scared of flying at the time so took the 50 grand in cash instead, bit of a shrewd move in hindsight methinks.
He’s been on a plane a few times since though but he’s still not keen. He doesn’t exactly live the millionaire lifestyle after putting a good bit of it in a few investments but with no real day to day worries and being able to treat themselves, ( and us) when they feel like it, I wouldn’t mind swapping with him!
Played it religiously from day one up till it changed to £2 a line. Haven't played it since.
You know the winners that say, ‘oh I never normally play, I just had a feeling I should buy a ticket that week and I won!’
I try and do that, just buying tickets completely at random, always a lucky dip.
So far I have won three times, totalling £58 million.
Edit, damn auto correct. *Haven’t.
I keep meaning to buy a ticket, but I dont know which one to go for
Euromillions sounds good
There doesnt seem any other way for me to get rich, I might as well give god a chance to help out
My sister was a struggling single mum of two kids when she won 175k about 20 years ago. She promptly paid off her mortgage and used the other 100k to buy into a small shop in Portugal where she now lives. Her small shop is now one of the largest textile retailers in the algarve. It doesn't have to be millions to be life changing.
I do it most weeks, Lotto syndicate at work, occasionally a Euro ticket for myself.
I understand the probability, but it's nice to have a laugh, maybe get the odd small win, and do a bit for causes - the Lottery Fund has helped a lot of projects round here.
It is possible that I am personally responsible for funding Team GBs Olympic success since about 1998.
Play when I remember. There's so many people say it's a waste of money, which technically is true, but I like to day dream about what I'd do if I win, so I'm paying for the right to do that! Yeah the odds are impossibly long.... but people do win it and it's just as likely to be me as anyone else.
still play the euro a bit, I know I'm not going to win but it's nice to daydream sometimes... latest one is pilots licence... and buy a spitfire (I didn't realize there was companies that will train you to solo one for £50kish) along with a white woolly jumper and pretend to be Robert Shaw in the BOB "DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA-DAKA!"
It's a tax on the poor and desperate. Odds are shite and some of the good causes are a bit questionable. I'll pass.
@klunk, have a go in the 2 seat spitfires, you get to fly it a bit and make the machine gun noises. A lot less than 50k too...
Yeah, I play.
Never won much and only ever do the lucky dip so I don't feel bad if I miss a draw.
As some have said, having set numbers would be a right mare if they came up and you didn't get the ticket.
To me it's a dream tax.
I joined the work syndicate, as there no way I'm being abandon in the office, if they win!
I also do the larger euro lottery ones, cause we can all dream after all & it would be great to be able to give my extended family & friends a helping hand.
Statistically speaking It used to be the case that although you lose your stake on the lottery, youre actually better off investing your money in a high interest account and using the interest to buy lottery tickets than you are buy premium bonds.
Dunno if this is still the case given the lottery added an extra ball but equally premium bond rates are always going down so I expect it is.
My office does it, I don't. Fair to say that if they ever win, I'm going to be quite grumpy.
Do it through work only because I don't know where the light switches are in the office.
Do it through work only because I don’t know where the light switches are in the office.
I wonder if businesses are able to insure against some lucky numbers coming up and their entire workforce ****ing off 🙂
I wonder if businesses are able to insure against some lucky numbers coming up and their entire workforce **** off 🙂
Funnily enough, a lot of commercial package policies do have that. Got to be a jackpot I think, plus a dozen other caveats, but I think it pays out either a fixed amount of like a business interruption claim.
Also, most golf clubs have hole - in - one cover too, to pay members bar tabs.
I bought £5 worth of £1 scratch cards this evening off the back of this thread.
I won £1!
I'll go and cash that in tomorrow for another £1 scratch card and will promptly win nothing. Then I'll forget about the lottery for another two years.
Yes, still playing the lottery from time to time.
Biggest win so far is £100 from a scratch card.
Stopped doing the National Lottery when it went up to £2 a pop, now only do The Health Lottery occasionally. Tried The Postcode Lottery for a year or so but packed that in cos I'd won FA.
My luck is crap though, if I didn't have bad luck, I wouldn't have any luck at all.
OH buys a lucky dip (Euro or UK) for us occasionally, we sometimes win another lucky dip but have never had anything more than a tenner or whatever the next crappest 'prize' is now. Meh.
Every once in a while.
Impulse buy at a supermarket usually when I see it's a multi-rollover.
The MD of the last chemical engineering place I worked at, him and his wife had set it up based on their win of a couple of million £.
It's the only way I'll ever get that Ferrari.
Ferrari, yeah right! we all know you'll blow it on coke 'n' hookers.
I have a new next door neighbour. They won £18m on the lottery. After buying the house the next thing he did was have an electrician install 13 double sockets in his garage. 13. I have one single socket. Obviously my next move was to get a sparky round to my place and install 14 sockets. His lottery win is costing me a fortune.
I do when I remember to buy a ticket (just play online). If I ever won big I'd give most of it to Charity asap before it destroyed me, however a couple of £m as a pension would be nice...
If you want to score a goal you have to be in the park. Yeah I play it, direct debit has been going out for years. Don't know my numbers so could just stop but yes, someone has to win it. Knowing my luck it'll be me the day before I die. Bugger.
Won more lucky dips that I have cash. Unlucky dips more like. Bugger.
I play every now and then, usually Euromillions, the new Set-For-Life, which would do very nicely, thank you, and sometimes the Health Lottery when they do the £250k draw.
Ferrari, yeah right! we all know you’ll blow it on coke ‘n’ hookers.
Nah I'd rather go out in a 200mph ball of flame.
Of course I do.Its the keystone of my long term financial planning.
We play occasionally, but I do feel that the prizes kinda reflect society/peoples comments about it being a poor peoples tax.
1 person with a massive amount at the top and all of the other 'winners' get enough to play next week.
Even the advertising is typical of the language used by politicians today telling us how lucky we are, '30,000 of you were winners tonight' yeah cheers, 25k people won £2.50 and 5k won £9.70. Winners indeed.