A SHOP worker told the High Court yesterday he initially thought a mechanic was joking when he said a play slip with numbers which would have won him £250,000 had not been entered in a Lotto machine.
Mr Liam McKay, whose wife runs the post office at Cork Street, Dublin, added that a lot of people said that but he found out very quickly that the man was not joking.
He was giving evidence on the second day of an action against An Post National Lottery Co by Mr Stephen Carroll, of Brittas, south Dublin. Mr Carroll claims he is entitled to more than £250,000 from the National Lotto because one of his play slips with the winning numbers was not entered in the Lotto draw on January 9th, 1993.
He claims he submitted 32 panels of numbers on eight play slips at the post office. Two days later, when checking the winning numbers, he found one play slip had not been entered while another with two panels had been entered twice. Mr Carroll claims that if his play slip had been entered, he would have won £250,000.
The company denies the claims and pleads that it is stated on the playslips "Before leaving the Lotto agent's premises, check the numbers on your tickets to ensure they were the ones you have chosen. Your ticket is the only valid receipt for claiming a prize."
In evidence for the defence yesterday, Mr McKay said he knew Mr Carroll to see. His initial reaction when Mr Carroll came into the post office and told him what had happened about the playslip not being entered was that it was a joke.
However, he found out very quickly that Mr Carroll was serious. He told him to go to National Lottery headquarters in Lower Abbey Street. A couple of days later, Mr Carroll returned and said he had gone to head quarters but got no satisfaction.
Mr McKay said he could not remember Mr Carroll in the post office on January 19th, a Saturday. Asked if he had been told any time up to 7.45 p.m. that there had been a mistake Mr McKay said he would have taken the playslip the man claimed had been entered twice and cancelled it. He would then have entered one which had not been put in.
Asked if anyone had asked him for sight of the rules, he said the Lotto people gave him the rules but they were never asked for. He would have given the rules to Mr Carroll if he had been asked.
Mrs Dympna McKay told the court she was appointed a Lotto agent by an authorisation document While she had a copy of the rules in the shop, there were no leaflets displayed.
Eddie Banville, marketing development manager national Lottery, said the Lotto ticket was the only valid receipt for the game played.
Ms Kathleen Grace, computer operations manager, GTECH, said her responsibility was to look after the central computer systems with the Lottery. The times, between the transactions on the tickets concerned were three seconds, 10 seconds and six seconds. The transaction happened at 12.16.51 pm. Identical playslips were sometimes entered. While there were duplications, it would not be possible to say if the same person had entered the same numbers.
Earlier, under cross examination, Mr Carroll agreed it would not be practicable for the person who put the playslip into the machine to look for theirs on it. He also agreed it might be reasonable for the player to do so.
Mr John McMenamin for Mr Carroll said there had been no effort to highlight the rules.
Mr Maunce Gaffney SC for the defence said the actions of Mr Carroll in entering the Lotto game were subject to the rules. He did not familiarise himself with them and did not ask to see them.
The hearing resumes next Thursday.