£112,000 AWAITING LOTTERY CLAIMS

Press, Volume CV, Issue 30973, 1 February 1966, Page 1

£112,000 AWAITING LOTTERY CLAIMS

(New Zealand Press Association)

WELLINGTON, January 31.

Awaiting claim by people who have bought Golden Kiwi and Mammoth tickets and are oblivious of their good fortunes is £112,000.

Of this £25,000 is last last year’s prize money. Another £37,000 was won but not claimed the year before.

The money began building up after the first Golden Kiwi lottery on December 18, 1961. Since then there have been 231 Golden Kiwis and seven mammoths.

Officials today could not say whether the money was invested in the National Providen’ Fund, as are the profits awaiting distribution. If it werfe, it would be earning interest.

The ultimate disposal of the unclaimed money will be in the hands of the Golden' Kiwi board of control. Its chairman is the Minister of Internal Affairs (Mr Seath), and its members include the Prime Minister (Mr Holyoake) and the Leader of the Opposition (Mr Kirk). An official of the Department of Internal Affairs today gave some of the reasons shy Golden Kiwi and mam moth lottery prize winners did not claim their winnings.

The department is holding £112,000 in unclaimed prize

money. All are minor prizes, the earliest dating back to the first Golden Kiwi lottery in December. 1961. Some of the prize winners, said the official, appeared to be interested only in the major prizes. They did not scan the published lists of prize winning numbers and waited until they got a notice Other lucky people got their cheques, but did not cash them in the six months during which the cheque was valid. Other prize-winners are among New Zealand’s large shifting population of shearers, freezing workers, fencing contractors and forest workers who buy a ticket and move on before they hear of their good' fortune. Some winners lose their tickets and fail to claim their prizes.

Others fail to remove their tickets from pockets of clothing going into the wash —but the prizes are paid out so long as the details on the ticket are legible. But the last category that the official mentioned are those who died before they

can collect their winnings. It is the duty of their executors, should the ticket come to light, to claim the prize and pay it into the deceased’s estate.