Loto Quebec Owes Answers Regarding Insider Fraud

Loto-Quebec has been strangely silent in view of the insider winner scandal that brewed in Ontario last year. Perhaps they consider the problem unique to Ontario, but more likely are afraid of opening a Pandora's box. Their silence in regard to the problem is scandalous.

It seems that Ontario's Ombudsman Andre Marin, blew the whistle on insider fraud and theft in 2007, at the Ontario Lottery and Gaming. Loto retailers were cashing winning tickets at an extraordinary rate and fraud was the culprit. It appears that at least 198 million dollars was shifted away from legitimate winners by a variety of means.

Here's how it's done, from a comment on the article in the Toronto Star entitled "Lotto's Dirty Secret"

How it can be done.
You hand your winning ticket to a retailer and he switches it for a loser and the machine says you are not a winner. Before the signature requirement to check your ticket it was easy to do. The 12.5 million dollar winner could not tell the O.L.G. where she purchased the ticket that generated the winning free ticket because she had not purchased it in the first place.The person who the retailer stole the ticket from went to the O.L.G. with all the correct information about the winning ticket but the lottery insiders paid out the 12.5 prize even when they knew the wrong person was claiming it. If you want the whole story read the Ombudsman's report. Since the O.L.G. audit only revealed the fraud and corruption in Ontario how many more insiders stole from the other 4 lottery corporations in Canada???????????????

Submitted by larryl at 8:57 PM Saturday, February 07 2009

Read the enlightening document prepared by the Ontario Ombusman entitled A Game of Trust

In light of the scandal, a big shakeup occurred at the OLG and strict measures are being implemented to combat fraud. Here's a link to see what the measures the OLG adopted.

Now if you think this problem is isolated to Ontario, think again. A CBC News investigation has uncovered that there are similar problems at the the Western Canada Lottery Corporation, where lottery clerks are actually claiming prizes at a disproportionately high rate. Read the article over at the CBC.ca website.

What about Loto Quebec? Cognizant of what is happening around the country, why haven't they undertaken a similar investigation. Do they believe that Quebec retailers are inherently more honest or are they afraid of what they will find?

Although they haven't investigated or admitted to the problem of insider fraud, Loto-Quebec has introduced new measures to reduce cheating. As of January 1, 2009, they have added a signature box to each ticket. For other safety measures refer to the related page on the Loto-Quebec site.

So tell us, Loto-Quebec, how much money have Quebeckers been defrauded of?