- Video shows California Lottery spokesperson Carolyn Becker detailing why the vetting process takes awhile.
- California Lottery has yet to announce a winner
BROADCAST TRANSCRIPT:
There’s been a great deal of speculation concerning the person holding the golden power ball ticket, purchased in Frazier Park last October.
In October, the Midway Market and Liquor in Frazier Park sold a winning Powerball ticket.
But, nobody has claimed it... not yet.
Locals have been speculating who the potential winner might be. Word on the street is that someone took the ticket down to the San Diego area. But at this moment, the California Lottery says it's just a rumor.
California Lottery spokesperson, Carolyn Becker, says the vetting process is quite vigorous– generally taking six to eight weeks.
She said, “It’s not uncommon in a small town like Frazier Park for there to be a lot of talk or maybe even some scuttle about who won. I would say trust the process right? We have this process in place for a reason.”
Explaining the process, Becker said, “All the paperwork associated with it, making sure that the claimant has filled everything outright, it can take weeks, sometimes even months depending on the circumstances.”
She added, “For context, we process over 10,000 large claims a month at our headquarters building in Sacramento.”
So verifying the actual winner can be a lengthy process.
“Our law enforcement will call the claimant and ask a series of questions,” Becker said. “Those range from how many tickets did you buy? When did you buy them?...”
One of the biggest things the California Lottery advises people to do is sign the back of the ticket.
Becker said, “All California Lottery players, no matter what game they’re playing, no matter whether they win or not, should sign the back of the ticket when you buy it that acknowledges ownership. It’s one piece of evidence we look at when we’re vetting eventual winners.”
Another piece of advice from the California Lottery– is knowing who to trust with the win.
“The ticket is the key to the prize. That piece of paper becomes worth whatever that prize money is. So it might be the most valuable piece of paper that you own,” Becker said.
So whether or not rumors are true, they are still just that– rumors.
Becker said, “We know there’s a lot of public interest in this case in particular, in many of our big wins, and so we’ll proactively make an announcement when the time comes.”
And until California Lottery announces that they have verified a ticket winner, the community is left to play the waiting game.
California Lottery offers a handbook on its website, advising how winners should best protect themselves and their prize.
The lottery ticket winner has a year since the winning ticket was announced to claim the ticket before California Lottery re-draws.
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