A large minority of retailers observed as part of a fact-finding exercise by the National Lottery regulator did not take sufficient measures to prevent the sale of lottery products to people under 18 years of age in 2024, the watchdog has said in its annual report.
The Office of the Regulator of the National Lottery (ORNL) said that while 72 per cent of retailers were fully compliant, an “unacceptable” 28 per cent were not implementing the rules – such as displaying the appropriate signage – properly.
The regulator undertook a so-called mystery shopper exercise in 2024, examining compliance with the rules governing the sale of lotto products to children.
While “progress has been made” since the regulator’s first mystery shopper exercise in 2018, it has required the non-compliant operators to take “tougher actions” to increase awareness of and compliance with the law, it said on Monday.
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Following on from the exercise, the regulator said it published advice to parents and guardians about how they can talk to children about lottery products.
Meanwhile, the regulator said it also withheld €23,000 in payments to the National Lottery operator, Premier Lotteries Ireland (PLI), last year due to a breach of its operating licence.
The breach related to an errant “software release” to PLI’s systems by a third-party company, which meant the “check my numbers” facility on the National Lottery website was available to users at a time when it should not have been, the regulator said.
This meant that some lotto players were erroneously told their tickets were not winners while the draw was still being verified.
“This issue lasted six weeks and may have contributed to up to 394 prizes, totalling €2,299, going unclaimed; one €250 prize and all others ranging from €24 down to €2,” according to the report.
“The unclaimed prizes potentially affected were returned to players as part of additional prizes in National Lottery games,” the regulator added.
“While the impact of this on potential prize winners was limited, this issue had the potential to have had a significant effect on a large prize winner.”
ORNL said the risk was “not tolerable”, and so it commissioned an independent assessment of PLI’s systems by IT experts from Grant Thornton, which identified no other concerns.
Sales of National Lottery tickets reached €855.7 million last year, up 3.2 per cent from 2023.
Online sales represented 18.1 per cent of the total, up from 15.9 per cent in 2023.
