Lottery tickets slip under dual pricing laws

GOVERNMENT lottery tickets have been spared from dual pricing in the run up to the island’s adoption of the euro because they are not a material possession and do not provide a service, officials said yesterday.

“Lottery tickets are like a contract. You give me £1 and you can win these prizes,” Government Lottery director Stavros Michael said.

“A lot of people think that because you can buy lottery tickets from different places that they are the same as goods or services. They are not. It’s like a contract which is why they didn’t have to display their price in pounds and euros.”

This was why their value was not clearly printed in both Cyprus pounds and their equivalent euro value, unlike other items on the market which have displayed both prices since September 1.

Michael said a lot of people had asked for clarification regarding why both amounts weren’t being depicted on lottery tickets.

“We took out an advert explaining why we did but the campaign was not only because people had asked about them. They were also part of our planning to keep the public informed about what is going on,” Michael said.

Winners of scratch cards or lottery tickets purchased in November or December who wanted to cash their winnings in the New Year would be paid in euros according to the exchange rate, he added.

The government lottery director told the Cyprus Mail the euro tickets for the first six months of 2008 had already been ordered and would start circulating on January 1.
“Until then we’ve been told we can’t sell them,” he said.

Forty to fifty million government lottery tickets are sold each year, he added.
??

??

??

??

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.