They believed to win hundreds of thousands of euros and will in fact receive only ten euros: a Norwegian company apologized to 47,000 lotto players on Monday due to an error in converting their earnings.
The group of games of chance owned by the Norwegian state, Norsk Tipping, explained that it has published amounts of incorrect earnings after a Eurojackpot draw on Friday, due to an error conversion error into Norwegian crowns.
The gains had been multiplied by 100 instead of being divided by 100, said the company.
Ole Fredrik Sveen is one of the disappointed players. He was on vacation in Greece when he received the message from Norsk Tipping announcing that he had won 1.2 million Norwegian crowns (around 101,000 euros or 94,000 francs).
“I said to myself: ‘Waouh, is it finally my turn?’ I went to the Norsk Tipping site, and there, in black on white was written: ‘Congratulations, you won! “Told Ole Fredrik Sveen to the NRK public channel on Monday. In reality, he had won 125 Norwegian crowns (around 10.5 euros or 9.8 francs).
“A meager consolation”
Ole Fredrik Sveen and the 47,000 other players received a message of excuses from Norsk Tipping on Monday for this scraper.
“These apologies are meager consolation. They should have sent them just after the error, not today,” Ole Fredrik Sveen told NRK.
Norsk Tipping was strongly criticized for this error, not only by disappointed players, but also by the Norwegian authorities.
Reviving on the company
The Norwegian Games of Chance Authority announced on Monday that it has launched an investigation to determine if the Games Act has been breaking. The Minister of Culture Lubna Jaffery described this error as “completely unacceptable”.
The director general of the company Tonje Sagstuen resigned on Saturday following the scandal, leaving the interim director general Vegar Strand to apologize.
The fact that the company is owned by the State makes this error problematic, said the manager, stressing that the company “depends entirely on the confidence of the population”.
“We have deeply disappointed our customers and assume full responsibility for rectifying the situation. Such errors are serious for a company responsible for managing the confidence of Norwegians,” said Vegar Stand.
AFP/AMI
