“While customers won’t be able to log in to MyLotto, they will be able to visit the website or app after the draw tonight to confirm the numbers that were drawn and prizes across each division and work out whether they are a winner.”
Lotto plans to be back to full functionality – including the ticker checker – tomorrow morning.
Tickets for Wednesday’s first draw of the 14-ball Powerball game will go on sale tomorrow.
Tonight’s must-win draw is unique in that it is only $10m. Under normal Powerball rules must-win draws are triggered when the pot reaches $50m. If there are no Powerball first division winners the money rolls down the divisions until a winner or winners are found.
Lotto NZ chief innovation and product officer Ben Coney said it was a must-win draw ”to clear the jackpot prize pool, before we reset the game to 14 balls and a brand-new starting jackpot of $5 million”.
“The great thing about must-be-won draws is that the prize often gets shared. We’ve previously held 13 must-be-won draws and in eight of those cases the jackpot has been split among multiple winners.”
The increase in the number of Powerballs from 10 to 14 enables a range of changes, including the addition of a new Powerball Division 8.
The starting Powerball jackpot will be $5m, and the pot will need to get to $60m to trigger a must-win draw.
Lotto NZ chief executive Jason Delamore said the changes will create thousands of extra winners through the introduction of the extra prize division, and prize amounts will increase across all divisions.
“However, the extra four balls will mean the odds of winning the Powerball jackpot will lengthen from 1 in 38.4 million per line to 1 in 53.7 million.
“That means on a Powerball ticket with 10 lines the chance of winning the big one will be 1 in 5.37 million.”
Chris Knox is a scientist turned data-journalist who investigates the stories behind the numbers, and creates interactives for Herald readers to explore them.