Norsk Tipping faces another fine after picking wrong lottery winners
The operator drew 52 incorrect winners after excluding some players.
Norway.- The Norwegian gambling regulator Lotteritilsynet has issued a warning and proposed another fine against the state monopoly gambling operator Norsk Tipping after a technical error with its lottery offering. The regulator has proposed a fine of NOK 25m (€2.1m). The operator has three weeks to respond.
An error in the Superdraw on April 19 resulted in 52 incorrect winners of high prizes being drawn. The reason for the error was that players who had placed bets through cooperative banks around Christmas and New Year were deleted, and thus excluded from the draw at Easter. This affected 16,698 participants.
Norsk Tipping subsequently refunded the bets of those players who did not participate in the draw. However, the regulator believes that the draw itself was not conducted correctly according to the rules of Norway’s Gambling Act.
Suspicions over lottery draw
Lotteritilsynet has revealed that it considered stopping the draw on April 19 due to suspicions that there might be errors. However, Norsk Tipping assured that the draw would proceed as planned. A few days after the draw, Norsk Tipping submitted a preliminary security report in which it said that the super draw was conducted with the correct drawing basis and correct chances of winning.
“Trust that the draw and the basis for the draw will be correct is absolutely fundamental for a lottery. Therefore, it is very serious when this has not been the case,” said Tore Bell, director of the regulator.
He added: “This is grossly negligent. Norsk Tipping did not check that all numbers were included in the draw, even though they had knowledge at the time that there had been serious errors in the draw basis over a long period of time.
“We can stop a lottery that is not being carried out correctly. We considered that in this case, but we received repeated guarantees that the draw would proceed correctly. It is unacceptable that there was still an error in the draw.”
The error is the latest in a string of blunders at Norsk Tipping that has increased calls for Norway to rethink its monopoly gambling model. Lotteritilsynet has already issued three fines against the operator in the past year due to violations of the Gambling Act and gambling regulations, including for breaches of self-exclusion requirements and for drawing the wrong winners in the national additional prize in Eurojackpot and Superdraw over several years
In addition, the regulator has notified Norsk Tipping that it is considering giving the company a fine of up to NOK 10m for an error that occurred in connection with the Eurojackpot draw on June 27, when players was informed of prize amounts that were significantly higher than the actual amounts.
The regulator has announced a major inspection this autumn that will look at Norsk Tipping’s Lotto, Eurojackpot and Vikinglotto offerings. However, after the Norwegian general election, the operator’s monopoly appears to be safe for now.
