Prayut pleased at digital lottery solving overpricing problem

Government spokesman Thanakorn Wangboonkongchana said Prayut was overjoyed after an opinion survey found that people were satisfied with the sale of two draws so far of digital lottery.

After using several measures and making legal threats to unsuccessfully end the overpricing practice, the government has turned to use the Paotang app of Krung Thai Bank to sell the digital lottery version with a face-value of 80 baht.

The digital lottery version turned out to be popular with buyers snapping up over 5 million tickets in only a few days after the selling started for each of the last two draws.

The opinion survey cited by Prayut was a proof of the success of the latest measure, according to a study by Super Poll.

Thanakorn said the survey found that 79.7 per cent of the respondents were satisfied that they could buy fairpriced lottery tickets via the Paotang app.

The spokesman said the survey also found that 90.7 per cent of the respondents wanted the Government Lottery Office to increase the number of digital lottery tickets so that middlemen and those who sold overpriced lottery tickets would be eliminated from the market.

Thanakorn said the Super Poll also found that 89.8 per cent of the respondents wanted the government to use the model of digital lottery to tackle other issues.

“The survey results showed that the government’s use of technology to tackle the issue of overpriced lottery made people happy,” Thanakorn said.

“The prime minister has instructed the agencies concerned to tackle the issue of overpriced lottery with concrete results by allowing people to really buy lottery tickets at 80 baht each.”

He quoted Prayut as saying that the digital lottery was an example of using technology to end profit-taking and irregularities in lottery selling.

Prayut also thanked all government agencies for successfully implementing his policy, the spokesman added.