A Benalla mum was completely oblivious to winning a $580,000 TattsLotto prize for more than four months, revealing the lottery ticket was in her car amongst a pile of old receipts the entire time.
The Victorian held one of the nine division one winning entries across Australia in TattsLotto draw 4273, drawn Saturday, 2 July 2022. She scored a division one prize of $580,525.35.
The winning entry was unregistered, which meant officials from The Lott had no way of contacting the ticketholder to break the life-enhancing news and had to wait for her to come forward.
“Oh my god! I had no idea!” she laughed when an official from The Lott spoke to her after she claimed her prize.
“I didn’t know about the win this entire time. I’ve been driving around with this lottery ticket worth $580,000 in my car for more than four months!
“I discovered the win when I went through a pile of old receipts and lottery tickets that had been hidden in my car.
“I took them straight to the local newsagency to check them and the lovely team member nearly started crying for me when the division one notification came up on the lottery terminal.
“The team at Benalla Pharmacy know me as a regular, so it was a really sweet moment.
“My family and I were scared to believe the winning news until we went to The Lott head office to claim the prize.
“As soon as I told my sister and mum about the news, my sister said, ‘Are you getting scammed? Where are you?’. I had to reassure her that it wasn’t a scam!
“We got up in the early hours of the morning the next day and drove straight to The Lott head office in Docklands to claim the prize.
“I’m really happy and grateful to have won. This is life-changing for me.”
When asked how she planned to enjoy her windfall, the gleeful woman shared it would help her family buy a house and enjoy a long-overdue holiday.
“I can look forward to buying my first family home!” she said.
“I’d love to book a little holiday. It’s been a long time coming!”
Her winning entry was purchased at Benalla Pharmacy, 83 Bridge Street, Benalla.
Benalla Pharmacy manager Electra Gercovish said she was over the moon to hear their mystery division one winner had finally claimed her prize and wished her all the best with her windfall.
The winning numbers in TattsLotto draw 4273 on 2 July 2022 were 17, 15, 10, 42, 31 and 37, while the supplementary numbers were 7 and 11.
Across Australia, there were nine division one winning entries in TattsLotto draw 4273 – four in Victoria, two in Queensland and one each in New South Wales, Northern Territory and Western Australia.
The Lott’s division one winning tally has now reached 383 so far this calendar year, including 153 won by Tatts customers.
In FY22, TattsLotto created 196 millionaires across Australia.
During this time, there were 324 division one winning in TattsLotto entries across Australia that collectively won more than $461.69 million.