(UK) Changes to the UK Lotto in Autumn 2013.

[Frank]

Well last nights first £2 draw had the lowest Saturday ticket sales ever at 23.5 million (using RK Lloyd's estimate) which was an 8% fall on ticket sales compared with the previous Saturday. This despite it being a £10 million Superdraw and the one off tempter of 1000 x £20,000 raffle winners. Obviously at £2 a ticket this represented an 84% rise in revenue, but this was just for this draw, future draws won't have the same incentives unless they are multiple rollovers, so its early days.

 

[Frank]

I notice Camelot have published their updated game procedures to include the new Lotto raffle, and have quietly slipped in the following clause:-

" All or part of the amount available for the Match 6 category in the previous Lotto Draw may also be used to pay additional Lotto raffle Prizes if there are no winning Entries in the Match 6 category in the previous Lotto Draw".
So they can reduce the rollover amount to pay for extra raffle tickets in the next draw. I note the odds of winnng the raffle are 20,000 (per million tickets sold) to 1. So If they can sell 25 million tickets like they could a week ago the odds of winning a normal ( 50 raffle winners) draw would be half a million to 1. . Even with 4 x (1000 raffle winners) chances last night (I played 4 tickets) I won nothing.

 

[Frank]

Here is a chart of the 2013 UK lotto sales, in millions of tickets.

http://i42.tinypic.com/1zntpj9.png

The price change on draw 1856 is depicted by the red line. After the price increase, Saturday ticket sales so far have dropped by about 20% and Wednesday sales have dropped by over 40% despite superdraws and rollovers being included in some of these latest draws. If Wednesday sales continue to fall to 50% of previous levels, then the effect of doubling the price may be self defeating.

 

[Frank]

I notice that in draw 1860, advertised as a £6.2 million rollover draw - where £2.5 million had rolled over from 1859 , they actually implemented the above mentioned rule (creaming off some of the rollover money to pay for raffle tickets) but misled the public into thinking all the money was available for a jackpot.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2477173/A-lot-lotto-win-Work-syndicate-sees-1-5m-taken-jackpot-blunder-Camelot.html

It seems about a million pounds of rollover money went into the raffle fund and used to pay for the extra 50 x£20,000 raffle prizes leaving £1.5 million to add to the jackpot pool.

Ticket sales have continued to fall for each consecutive Saturday and Wednesday draw since the price went up.

 

[Icewynd]

Ticket sales have continued to fall for each consecutive Saturday and Wednesday draw since the price went up.

Sounds like the lottery buying public isn't as stupid as they thought we were!

 

[PAB]

Hi Frank,

Well spotted and a very thorough analysis, as usual.
I think that Camelot think that the Lotto playing public don't notice things like this, perhaps because they do have a hidden agenda afterall. As we have both seen, and indeed predicted, the Lotto playing public have moved the Lotto that they now play, possibly to the Health Lotto or ThunderBall Lotto. I also noticed that the bookies have now taken on bourd the Health Lotto with a guaranteed Jackpot higher than that with the Health Lotto.
As I have said previously, I still do my one line for the Wednesday and Saturday draws, but if I decide to have an extra flutter I put my money on the ThunderBall.

Regards,
PAB


-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-
12:45, restate my assumptions.
(1) Mathematics is the language of nature.
(2) Everything around us can be represented and understood through numbers.
(3) If you graph the numbers of any system, patterns emerge. Therefore, there are patterns, everywhere in nature.

 

[PAB]

Well, yet another bad Main Lotto draw for Camelot last night based on Ticket Sales!

There was the lowest number of winners since the Lotto started for the Match 5, Match 4 & Match 3 numbers.
Well they certainly can't back track on the price increase, but I wonder if they care?

Regards,
PAB


-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-∏-
12:45, restate my assumptions.
(1) Mathematics is the language of nature.
(2) Everything around us can be represented and understood through numbers.
(3) If you graph the numbers of any system, patterns emerge. Therefore, there are patterns, everywhere in nature.

 

[Frank]

Their ticket sales seem to have settled down to a drop in tickets sold (compared with pre Oct 5th) of 30% on a Saturday draw and a drop of 45% on a Wednesday draw. These still mean in increase in revenue for Camelot, so they are probably feeling pleased with themselves at the moment.