Hope into heartache—$76 million lotto win? Not quite what it seemed
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We’ve all had that daydream—what would you do if you suddenly won the lottery?
A new car, a trip around Australia, maybe even a little something for the grandkids.
But for thousands of hopefuls in Norway, that fantasy turned into a rollercoaster of emotions after a jaw-dropping blunder in the EuroJackpot lottery.
Picture this: you check your phone and see a message saying you’ve won a 'high prize' in the $76 million EuroJackpot draw.
Your heart skips a beat, you start planning that long-awaited holiday, maybe even eyeing off a new home.
But then, just as quickly, the rug is pulled out from under you. It was all a mistake—a technical hiccup that left dreams dashed and trust shaken.
So, what exactly happened? The culprit was Norsk Tipping, the company responsible for handling EuroJackpot notifications in Norway.
Also read: Lotto winner calls out worker for allegedly stealing earnings
A few thousand players in Norway’s EuroJackpot believed they’d scored big in last Friday’s $A76 million draw, only to have their excitement swiftly crushed.
These players received messages claiming they had won ‘high prizes’ in the pan-European lottery. But shortly after, they were told it had all been a mistake—the result of a coding error.
The alerts came from Norsk Tipping, the company responsible for notifying Norwegian EuroJackpot participants.
According to the company, the prize amounts, originally in euros, had been converted into Norwegian kroner. That’s where things went wrong.
A ‘manual error’ in the code led to a miscalculation. Instead of dividing the prize amounts by 100 as intended, the system multiplied them, falsely suggesting ‘big wins’ for the affected players.
‘The error was discovered after a short time but the damage was done,’ said Norsk Tipping, as reported by The New York Times, which also noted the resignation of the company’s chief executive, Tonje Sagstuen.
A regretful Sagstuen shared that several players had already begun making life-changing plans: ‘We understand of course that this is a breach of trust.’
The company hasn’t confirmed how many players were impacted.
However, Norsk Tipping’s chairwoman Sylvia Brustad echoed the sentiment: ‘We are determined to clean up and improve ourselves.’
Read next: Would you turn down $40,000? See what happened after one contestant rejected a huge jackpot on Tipping Point!
We’d love to hear from you! Have you ever had a close call with a lottery win, or maybe a funny story about a ticket mix-up? How would you react if you thought you’d won big, only to find out it was a mistake? Share your thoughts and stories in the comments below!
A new car, a trip around Australia, maybe even a little something for the grandkids.
But for thousands of hopefuls in Norway, that fantasy turned into a rollercoaster of emotions after a jaw-dropping blunder in the EuroJackpot lottery.
Picture this: you check your phone and see a message saying you’ve won a 'high prize' in the $76 million EuroJackpot draw.
Your heart skips a beat, you start planning that long-awaited holiday, maybe even eyeing off a new home.
Thousands of Norwegian EuroJackpot players were mistakenly told they had won 'high prizes' in a $76 million draw due to a coding error. Image source: Waldemar / Unsplash.
But then, just as quickly, the rug is pulled out from under you. It was all a mistake—a technical hiccup that left dreams dashed and trust shaken.
So, what exactly happened? The culprit was Norsk Tipping, the company responsible for handling EuroJackpot notifications in Norway.
Also read: Lotto winner calls out worker for allegedly stealing earnings
A few thousand players in Norway’s EuroJackpot believed they’d scored big in last Friday’s $A76 million draw, only to have their excitement swiftly crushed.
These players received messages claiming they had won ‘high prizes’ in the pan-European lottery. But shortly after, they were told it had all been a mistake—the result of a coding error.
The alerts came from Norsk Tipping, the company responsible for notifying Norwegian EuroJackpot participants.
According to the company, the prize amounts, originally in euros, had been converted into Norwegian kroner. That’s where things went wrong.
A ‘manual error’ in the code led to a miscalculation. Instead of dividing the prize amounts by 100 as intended, the system multiplied them, falsely suggesting ‘big wins’ for the affected players.
‘The error was discovered after a short time but the damage was done,’ said Norsk Tipping, as reported by The New York Times, which also noted the resignation of the company’s chief executive, Tonje Sagstuen.
A regretful Sagstuen shared that several players had already begun making life-changing plans: ‘We understand of course that this is a breach of trust.’
The company hasn’t confirmed how many players were impacted.
However, Norsk Tipping’s chairwoman Sylvia Brustad echoed the sentiment: ‘We are determined to clean up and improve ourselves.’
Read next: Would you turn down $40,000? See what happened after one contestant rejected a huge jackpot on Tipping Point!
We’d love to hear from you! Have you ever had a close call with a lottery win, or maybe a funny story about a ticket mix-up? How would you react if you thought you’d won big, only to find out it was a mistake? Share your thoughts and stories in the comments below!
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