Unable to sell a single draw lottery ticket since Sunday, Loto-Québec hopes that things will be back to normal on Thursday, thanks to the return to work of its IT employees after a few days of strike.
The state-owned company has been going through a perfect storm since the weekend, fueled by a strike by its professional staff, a computer problem and the change in format of Lotto 6/49, the president and CEO of Loto summarized on Wednesday. -Quebec, Jean-Francois Bergeron.
During the night from Saturday to Sunday, an update of the Loto-Québec system failed, resulting in the paralysis of sales terminals, so that Quebecers can no longer buy or validate draw tickets. .
“This is the first in 50 years that we are not able to recover from a processing error,” said Mr. Bergeron in an interview with LCN.
Normally, Loto-Québec staff should have been able to limit the damage. However, the computer scientists were on strike alongside the other professionals of the state-owned company, preventing the technical problem from being resolved. Unionized workers finally returned to work on Wednesday following the signing of a tentative agreement on Tuesday.
Loto-Québec estimates that its customers buy $2 million in draw tickets per day, an amount that will not be entirely lost, believes Jean-François Bergeron, who finds it difficult to assess the losses incurred by Loto-Québec.
“There are several behaviors. There are people who are going to play online, scratch tickets too. We’ll see when we close the accounts. There may also be people who will buy two stakes, ”said the president and chief executive officer.
For their part, Lotto 6/49 draws will be able to resume from next Wednesday, with the new lottery format.
Loto-Québec had decided to postpone the deployment of the new formula, the first draw of which takes place this Wednesday, due to the strike by its professional workers.
Also, other draws for certain Quebec lotteries that could not take place due to technical problems, such as La Mini, Banco or Québec 49, will be resumed in the coming days.
“There is no problem for the draws, we will do them. There is no concern for integrity. Keep your tickets,” called Jean-François Bergeron.