Scratch cards are a very popular form of games of chance due to their low cost and their opportunities for an instant win as opposed to waiting for a draw as with the lottery. Scratch cards are becoming increasingly popular due to the increase in the amounts of the top prizes and the convenience in being able to play whenever you want, day or night, without having to wait for a weekly draw. Although scratch cards are unlikely to replace the lottery in terms of excitement levels and the potential of rollover jackpots, scratch cards actually offer much better odds of winning easy money, particularly of winning the top prize, than the odds of winning a second or first level prize in a regular lottery. The odds of matching five numbers and a bonus ball, in an English lottery game, for example is just 1 in 2,330,636 which is far, far less than the chance of winning a top prize in many scratch card games.
Instant Win Scratch Card Prizes
Although scratch card instant cash prizes are still generally less than those offered in regular lottery games, unlike lottery prizes, they are guaranteed. Whereas in most lottery draws, the amount of easy money you win depends on the total number of winners and the size of the jackpot fund, if you win the top prize in a scratch card game, you know exactly how much you will win. Scratch cards also offer a much wider range of choice of games than the lottery and the choice of playing for a smaller instant win top prize with a bigger chance of winning or for a larger top prize with a smaller chance of winning. While some American companies are beginning to offer scratch cards with larger easy money prizes that cost $20 or $30 with prizes in the millions of dollars, these are not instant win scratch cards but rather distribute the prizes over many years with no instant cash option.
Lotteries and Sweepstakes
Many American state lotteries also run a second chance sweepstakes in conjunction with selling state lottery scratch cards in an effort to increase consumer demand for scratch cards and to reduce the litter problems associated with the improper disposal of non-winning lottery tickets. These scratch card promotions can be entered with non-winning lottery tickets which are picked up as litter.
Break opens or strip tickets are lottery or bingo cards which have concealed letters, numbers or symbols which have been predetermined as winners. The cards, which are often made of cardboard with perforated cover window tabs which conceal the winning combinations, must be broken open in order to see the information printed within and then must be confirmed with the winning combinations printed on the back of the card. The winning combination will be highlighted so that it is easier to identify the winning tickets.
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