Florida Lottery Exposed — Grab Your Ray of Sunshine!
Florida Lottery Review
Florida – the sunshine state!
That sun definitely shines brighter for anyone with a bit of lottery luck, and if you want to be that person, the Florida Lottery app may be the answer to your prayers.
Launched by the official entity operating lotteries in Florida, the app and the corresponding website add to the Florida lottery operator’s range of services.
In the US, there are some federal and local limitations on the online sale of tickets. Is Florida one of the states affected by such restrictions? That’s a valid question, and we’re on a mission to give you a comprehensive, reliable answer today.
Online Games at Florida Lottery
If you are a Floridian, you already know the abundance of lotteries available to test your luck. Today, however, we’re talking about the Florida lottery website and the games you can play online through the portal.
And here is the bad news: right now, you cannot buy tickets online through the official FlaLottery portal. There are other operators and websites out there that provide such services. However, if you want to go down the official route, you will benefit from no such opportunity.
The same applies to the Florida Lotto App that was recently updated.
As per the official presentation, you can do a couple of things via the app, but the purchase of tickets isn’t one of those. The current range of functionalities includes checking your ticket to determine if you have won anything, entering your already purchased ticket into a second chance game, and creating digital payslips that you can later use for ticket purchase at an authorized retail venue.
That last one is a big disappointment. The only thing it does is speed the process up. Unfortunately, payment processing through the app isn’t available right now, and you need to walk yourself to a store to buy a ticket.
Is there an ongoing Jackpocket scam in Florida?
Fla Lottery and Claiming Your Prizes
It’s pretty straightforward for prizes less than $600. These can be claimed at any Florida Lottery retailer. If you are playing online, then this will be automatically credited to your account. For prizes from $601 to $250,000, wins can be claimed at any Florida State Lottery district office or Florida Lottery Headquarters in Tallahassee. Any prize over $250,000 awards must be requested at Florida Lottery Headquarters within 180 days of the draw.
Scratch-Offs have their own set of rules with specific dates that apply to start as short as 60 days after the end of the official game. Some folks try and monitor the number of Scratch-Offs sold per game and buy more and more tickets as the game is coming to a close.
Annuity Versus Cash Option
Lotteries at Flalottery.com offers two options for getting your big jackpot – an annuity or cash option. Florida Lotto and Powerball are paid out over 30 years, FL Mega Millions over 26, and Florida Mega Money for over 20 years. If a player opts for the cash option, then the amount of the jackpot won is (remember I am not a mathematician) less than the published jackpot. The amount published is based on the accrued value over the term of an annuity. Sounds confusing? It’s not. It still means winning a pretty colossal jackpot!
Who Can Play Via the Florida Lottery Website?
As already mentioned, Florida does not offer online ticket sales. Here’s an exact quote from the FlaLottery FAQ section:
The Florida Lottery does not offer the sale of Lottery tickets by mail, fax, or via the Internet, nor do we currently offer a subscription service. Tickets must be purchased from any of the more than 13,000 authorized Florida Lottery retailers in the state of Florida. Find an authorized Florida Lottery retailer.
This means that if you want to buy a ticket, you have to be physically present in Florida (whether you are a US citizen, a tourist, or someone who has a valid visa. As long as you meet this requirement, no additional restrictions are applying to you.
You will still have to go to a registered Florida Lottery office to get your ticket, however.
Who Is Behind the Florida Lottery?
This is a state-run Lottery governed by the Inspector General. It was set up to support education in the State of Florida. Each of the lotteries offered has different percentages of how much goes to the state and how much goes to prizes.
The Florida Lottery website is a reflection of this policy. It is an official digital representation of state policies, and you can rest assured that both the online platform and the app are 100 percent legitimate.
Other Bits and Pieces
There isn’t an awful lot more to say about the website because the range of functionalities is limited.
Florida lottery does offer a couple of interesting opportunities like the Second Chance previously mentioned. This is an option you can access via the website and the app. The additional game includes non-winning tickets in an extra drawing that can result in some additional prizes. If you haven’t won anything from the regular drawing, Second Chance may be the option to pursue.
The pros and cons of Fla Lotto include the following:
Why You Should Register with Florida Lottery?
Pros:
A website created by an official lottery entity
There is also a mobile app that was recently updated
You can enter into games like Second Chance via the website and app
A lot of information, extensive FAQ section
Good customer support
Why You Shouldn’t Register with Florida Lottery?
Cons:
Florida does not allow the online buying of tickets
The app also doesn’t support ticket buying; you can only enter Second Chance through it
If you want to play local lotteries, you’ll have to be physically present in Florida
Is Florida Lottery Legit?
Florida Lottery USA offers some great games. It is a legitimate platform. Unfortunately, however, the range of possibilities via the website and app is limited.
And that’s pretty much it! Sorry to disappoint with the information featured here, but we hope that the situation changes for the better shortly.
wilbur
I do not play. Was viewing options for possible gifts. This generated a flood of emails, some from a company in Chicago that is almost impossible to get away from. BEWARE!
Ned
I am beyond pissed off. This is really a scam and someone needs to seriously look into this. Something got changed drastically. We used to play scratch off games at work as a group and were able to win every now and then, prizes ranging from free ticket to 500$ almost bi weekly. For the last couple years absolutely nothing. We have not won anything. Free ticket at best. It doesn’t matter where you buy the ticket and how many there is absolutely nothing out there to be won. They are just printing bunch of loosing tickets. People stop buying that crap. You will not win. Someone needs to go to jail!!!
Michael F. Metelski
These people have a lot of balls paying out a 2 dollar prize on a 5/10/20 dollar ticket so when you hit a 10x icon or hit multiple numbers that all you get is your money back. I hit at least 10 times in the last two days where the prize was less than the ticket price. Been playing for a long time but I’m done. Screw you Florida lottery,…bunch of criminals.
Brian
Scratch off tickets are an absolute joke with the FL lotto. It’s one hell of a scam, that’s for sure. More times than not, I see the folks that don’t have the disposable income to blow, lose consistently. The FL lotto targets lower income classes with mislead hopes and flashy adverts that, in the end, are complete falsehoods. Shysters.
KC32
The Florida Lottery sucks! 99.7% of people playing their lottery system are going to lose. The paybacks on scratch tickets are a complete joke. The Florida Lotteys say’s “overall” odds to win on a scratch ticket are 1 in 3. However, when you take a closer look at the individual odds, for example on a $20 ticket, they say your odds to win just your money back are 1 in 6 and get progressively worse from there.
Therefore, the odds are saying they collect $168,000,000 ($8,400,000 x $20) before they payback 1 top prize of $5,000,000 to one “lucky winner” for a profit of only $163,000,000! Wow, good luck to everyone who plays this scam!! The odds seem a little off to me, when they say your best chance to win $20 are 1 in 6. If I am understanding this correctly, that means “on average” if you invest $120 and buy 6 tickets, you should win a whopping $20 back!! Then your odds progressively get 5x worse @ 30-1 to win anywhere between $25 – $50!! I am not sure how the Florida Lottery is getting away with this ridiculous scam?!?! However, they do a great job of making their players believe that next big ticket is so close if they keep going! Seriously people, look at the odds and know how many millions of losing tickets are printed before they payout out one top prize..
Odds of Winnings
Prize Amount Odds of Winning
$5,000,000 1-in-8,400,000
$1,000,000 1-in-1,680,000
$100,000.00 1-in-2,520,000
$10,000.00 1-in-120,000
$1,000.00 1-in-5,000
$500.00 1-in-179
$250.00 1-in-800
$100.00 1-in-37
$50.00 1-in-30
$40.00 1-in-30
$30.00 1-in-30
$25.00 1-in-30
$20.00 1-in-6
Overall Odds: 1-in-2.99
Bob
I have been playing the Florida Lottery scratch off tickets for 15 years. I play the $5, $10, $20 and $30 tickets. I have found that if you are lucky enough to win, all they really give you is your money back. If you are really lucky you might find a $50 or $100 winner but that is about it. I have written the Florida Lottery on many occasions as I felt their lottery scratch off tickets are rigged to lose. They don’t even respond to me anymore. If you pay attention to how the numbers fall when revealed, you will see there is a pattern that the numbers will fall. If you have a particular pattern, then the numbers revealed will jump over or go under your pattern by one number. Every game and every ticket is like this. They claim that the odds of winning $500 are better on the new $20 Gold Rush than the original. I used to win $500 on average of once every two weeks on the original $20 Gold Rush. I have been playing the classic $20 Gold Rush for over a year now and have yet to win $100 let alone $500. You have to wonder how they can claim they raised over 30 billion dollars for education (supposedly). You cannot boast those kind of statistics by giving the player any kind of real winning ticket. Where are the $5, 10, 20, 50 and 100 thousand dollar winners? Do they even exist? Especially if the player spends $20 or $30 for a ticket! It is a big joke.
Troy
Well fl lotto you did it to your self greed will always explode in your face just like it’s happening now nobody including myself are buying lotto tickets anymore can’t wait to sit back and watch how there going to steal players money and have very little prize amounts to give back because nobody’s play scratchoffs any tickets in my area have been on the same number for 3 and 4 days straight nobody buying. But im sure they will find some way for the taxpayers to bail him out o and i noticed if you try and hit the like thumb it dont work on reviews that bad mouth the lotto but the down thumb sur does work lmao but heck who are we kidding that’s the Florida Lotto for you