Do you do the lottery...?

SkintMonkey

I haven't bought a lottery ticket in years, but my husband wants us to start doing the wednesday and saturday lottery - which would be £2 a week.

Bearing in mind the chances of winning, this essentially is £2 down the drain (although he is very keen - 'got to be in it to win it') ...isn't it?!

pointypenguin

You have more chance of getting struck by lightening twice than of winning the lottery.

Why not look at putting that £2 into a jar and saving for a treat? Or look at premium bonds you get the gamble without losing the cash.

iwanttobreakfree

its a toughie this because i think well look at how many times ive entered and never won but someone has to win!

i think we'd all like to be millionaires but id be pretty teed off if i got to 70 and had spent god knows how much added up from playing once a week and never getting anywhere.

HairyHandofDartmoor

Oh and I never buy lottery tickets because we know we the odds of winning are insanely against us, and it seems like a waste of money.

£2 per week is £8 per month, or £96 per year. I would rather put the money into a high interest savings account, (or maybe buy premium bonds with it if you really want to gamble as at least you get your money back!)

blueneleh

I don't do the lottery but I do buy scratchcards every now and then.
I have won £200 and £50 on them before (and smaller amounts) so do still buy them a couple of times a month 'just to see'!

Have you seen the 'fantasy lottery' section on the 'what's the cost' website? It's interesting to see the results!

Shineyhappy

I only ever play the lottery once in a blue moon, I dont like wasting money, but occasionally if something lucky has happend I will buy a ticket. I dont mind wasting 5-10 pounds a year but thats about it for me.

Badger_Lady

I've always found it very tempting, but I remember one true story several years ago that puts it in perspective for me:

A man had recently started a new job as a salesman. He had to travel a lot in his car and had a laptop and mobile phone.

One evening, he was driving through a village miles from home and his car broke down. His mobile phone had no signal, so he pulled over and got out to walk into the village.

As he approached a telephone box, it started ringing. The man paused, then answered it. On the other end was his wife: "Hello, dear - do you know what time you'll be home for dinner tonight?"
"Actually I've just broken down - how did you... where did you get this number?"
"I've just called your mobile, dear - you gave me the number last week."
"No, actually you've just called a phonebox."

It turned out that his wife had written his mobile number and his payroll number on the same piece of paper, and dialled his payroll number, which happened to be the number for a phonebox that he had been approaching at the exact moment she dialled.

A mathematician (sorry, can't find source) worked out the probability of this happening at around 2,000,000 to 1. Much, much more likely than winning the lottery!

Idiophreak

If you work everything out in terms of mathematics and probabilities, life would get pretty dull pretty fast.

Anyway, I don't really work out the probability of winning in the same way other people seem to. The odds of "someone" winning the lottery is really of no interest to me. The odds of *me* winning the lottery, on the other hand, is of great interest to me.

Sadly, however, I can't know this before I play.

If I play 3 times, win on the third go, then never play again...I have a 3:1 chance of winning. That sounds pretty good to me.

Having said that, I don't actually play

Skint_Catt

I don't do the lottery as I'd rather put £2 towards a bottle of wine!

But my mum has had some regular luck on Thunderball - she wins £5 a draw mostly with the odd £10 thrown in here and there (she won something 5 weeks in a row last month). I think the odds must be better on than the main lotto!

rayday2

I do the lottery £4 a week I think so far this year I have £135 its a bit of fun it helps charity and you have to be in it to win it. If you budget for it and are not going short on some essentials why not we all need a little fun!

I do mine online once a month and I get nice emails telling me I have news about my ticket so if I do have the big win I will never miss out by losing my ticket

ellybelly89

Where does the money go?
The precise breakdown of the Lottery pound depends on the actual level of sales and the relevant arrangements within the Licence. A rough breakdown is:

• 50p is paid to winners in prizes;
• 28p is given to Good causes;
• 12p goes to the Government in Lottery duty;
• 5p is paid to National Lottery retailers on all National Lottery tickets sold; and
• 5p is retained by the operator to meet costs and return to shareholders.

The national lottery do fund one hell of a lot of projects. I know in my area if lottery funding hadn't come through there would be no theatre, no facilities for young people and that would have led to a detriment in local society.